Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Latin Via Proverbs 84

I hope these notes will help you tackle this group of proverbs in Latin Via Proverbs. This set of proverbs includes first conjugation verbs with third declension nouns.

Please note: to read the proverbs in Latin, you need to acquire a copy of the book from lulu.com! What I am providing here in the blog are notes to help people who are making their way through the book either in a Latin class or on their own.

Group 84

1103. Work brings wealth. (The Latin verb ditat is a contracted form of divitat, with the same root as the adjective dives, "rich.") Labor ditat.

1104. Love builds up. (You can see this motto illustrated in Otto Vaenius's emblem book.)

1105. Variety is pleasing. (Compare the English saying, "Variety is the spice of life.")

1106. Virtue alone bestows nobility. (This is the motto of Waverley College. Compare a similar notion expressed simply, Virtus, non stemma, "Virtue, not pedigree.")

1107. Virtue stands in the middle. (In other words, virtue consists in not going to extremes.)

1108. The truth stands in the middle. (Compare the English expression, "The truth is somewhere in between.")

1109. The work of the bards endures. (The phrase is adapted from one of Ovid's Amores.)

1110. He stands on his own strengths. (This phrase can be found in Livy.)

1111. Violence produces violence. (Although the Latin word vis can also be translated "strength," the word "violence" is definitely called for here.)

1112. Ambition arouses ambition. (The full quote from Seneca would be spes spem excitat, ambitionem ambitio, meaning that both hope, and ambition, spring eternal!)


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