And how much more do you think that this affects one's ability, which is entirely interwoven with the soul, – being moulded thereby, obeying its commands, and deriving therefrom its laws!
How Maecenas lived is too well-known for present comment
We know how he walked, how effeminate he was, and how he desired to display himself; also, how unwilling he was that his vices should escape notice
What, then?
Does not the looseness of his speech match his ungirt attire?
Are his habits, his attendants, his house, his wife, any less clearly marked than his words?
He would have been a man of great powers, had he set himself to his task by a straight path, had he not shrunk from making himself understood, had he not been so loose in his style of speech also
You will therefore see that his eloquence was that of an intoxicated man – twisting, turning, unlimited in its slackness

English is a broken degenerate language within itself

as far back as Bacon and Dee manipulated it

What is more unbecoming than the words: "A stream and a bank covered with long-tressed woods"?
And see how "men plough the channel with boats and, turning up the shallows, leave gardens behind them."
Or, "He curls his lady-locks, and bills and coos, and starts a-sighing, like a forest lord who offers prayers with down-bent neck."
Or, "An unregenerate crew, they search out people at feasts, and assail households with the wine-cup, and, by hope, exact death."
Or, "A Genius could hardly bear witness to his own festival"
Or "threads of tiny tapers and crackling meal"
Or "mothers or wives clothing the hearth."

Can you not at once imagine, on reading through these words, that this was the man who always paraded through the city with a flowing tunic?
For even if he was discharging the absent emperor's duties, he was always in undress when they asked him for the countersign
Or that this was the man who, as judge on the bench, or as an orator, or at any public function, appeared with his cloak wrapped about his head, leaving only the ears exposed, like the millionaire's runaway slaves in the farce?
Or that this was the man who, at the very time when the state was embroiled in civil strife, when the city was in difficulties and under martial law, was attended in public by two eunuchs – both of them more men than himself?
Or that this was the man who had but one wife, and yet was married countless times?
These words of his, put together so faultily, thrown off so carelessly, and arranged in such marked contrast to the usual practice, declare that the character of their writer was equally unusual, unsound, and eccentric
To be sure, we bestow upon him the highest praise for his humanity; he was sparing with the sword and refrained from bloodshed; and he made a show of his power only in the course of his loose living; but he spoiled, by such preposterous finickiness of style, this genuine praise, which was his due
For it is evident that he was not really gentle, but effeminate, as is proved by his misleading word-order, his inverted expressions, and the surprising thoughts which frequently contain something great, but in finding expression have become nerveless
One would say that his head was turned by too great success.

This fault is due sometimes to the man, and sometimes to his epoch
When prosperity has spread luxury far and wide, men begin by paying closer attention to their personal appearance
Then they go crazy over furniture
Next, they devote attention to their houses – how to take up more space with them, as if they were country-houses, how to make the walls glitter with marble that has been imported over seas, how to adorn a roof with gold, so that it may match the brightness of the inlaid floors
After that, they transfer their exquisite taste to the dinner-table, attempting to court approval by novelty and by departures from the customary order of dishes, so that the courses which we are accustomed to serve at the end of the meal may be served first, and so that the departing guests may partake of the kind of food which in former days was set before them on their arrival

When the mind has acquired the habit of scorning the usual things of life, and regarding as mean that which was once customary, it begins to hunt for novelties in speech also
now it summons and displays obsolete and old-fashioned words
now it coins even unknown words or misshapes them
and now a bold and frequent metaphorical usage is made a special feature of style, according to the fashion which has just become prevalent
Some cut the thoughts short, hoping to make a good impression by leaving the meaning in doubt and causing the hearer to suspect his own lack of wit
Some dwell upon them and lengthen them out
Others, too, approach just short of a fault – for a man must really do this if he hopes to attain an imposing effect – but actually love the fault for its own sake
In short, whenever you notice that a degenerate style pleases the critics, you may be sure that character also has deviated from the right standard

Just as luxurious banquets and elaborate dress are indications of disease in the state, similarly a lax style, if it be popular, shows that the mind (which is the source of the word) has lost its balance
Indeed you ought not to wonder that corrupt speech is welcomed not merely by the more squalid mob but also by our more cultured throng; for it is only in their dress and not in their judgments that they differ
You may rather wonder that not only the effects of vices, but even vices themselves, meet with approval
For it has ever been thus: no man's ability has ever been approved without something being pardoned
Show me any man, however famous; I can tell you what it was that his age forgave in him, and what it was that his age purposely overlooked
I can show you many men whose vices have caused them no harm, and not a few who have been even helped by these vices
Yes, I will show you persons of the highest reputation, set up as models for our admiration; and yet if you seek to correct their errors, you destroy them; for vices are so intertwined with virtues that they drag the virtues along with them
Moreover, style has no fixed laws; it is changed by the usage of the people, never the same for any length of time
Many orators hark back to earlier epochs for their vocabulary, speaking in the language of the Twelve Tables
Gracchus, Crassus, and Curio, in their eyes, are too refined and too modern; so back to Appius and Coruncanius!
Conversely, certain men, in their endeavour to maintain nothing but well-worn and common usages, fall into a humdrum style
These two classes, each in its own way, are degenerate; and it is no less degenerate to use no words except those which are conspicuous, high-sounding, and poetical, avoiding what is familiar and in ordinary usage One is, I believe, as faulty as the other: the one class are unreasonably elaborate, the other are unreasonably negligent; the former depilate the leg, the latter not even the armpit.

Let us now turn to the arrangement of words
In this department, what countless varieties of fault I can show you!
Some are all for abruptness and unevenness of style, purposely disarranging anything which seems to have a smooth flow of language
They would have jolts in all their transitions; they regard as strong and manly whatever makes an uneven impression on the ear
With some others it is not so much an "arrangement" of words as it is a setting to music; so wheedling and soft is their gliding style
And what shall I say of that arrangement in which words are put off and, after being long waited for, just manage to come in at the end of a period?
Or again of that softly-concluding style, Cicero-fashion, with a gradual and gently poised descent always the same and always with the customary arrangement of the rhythm!
Nor is the fault only in the style of the sentences, if they are either petty and childish, or debasing, with more daring than modesty should allow, or if they are flowery and cloying, or if they end in emptiness, accomplishing mere sound and nothing more.

Some individual makes these vices fashionable – some person who controls the eloquence of the day; the rest follow his lead and communicate the habit to each other
Thus when Sallust was in his glory, phrases were lopped off, words came to a close unexpectedly, and obscure conciseness was equivalent to elegance
L. Arruntius, a man of rare simplicity, author of a historical work on the Punic War, was a member and a strong supporter of the Sallust school
There is a phrase in Sallust: exercitum argento fecit, meaning thereby that he recruited an army by means of money
Arruntius began to like this idea; he therefore inserted the verb facio all through his book
Hence, in one passage, fugam nostris fecere; in another, Hiero, rex Syracusanorum, bellum fecit; and in another, quae audita Panhormitanos dedere Romanis fecere
I merely desired to give you a taste; his whole book is interwoven with such stuff as this
What Sallust reserved for occasional use, Arruntius makes into a frequent and almost continual habit – and there was a reason: for Sallust used the words as they occurred to his mind, while the other writer went afield in search of them
So you see the results of copying another man's vices
Again, Sallust said: aquis hiemantibus
Arruntius, in his first book on the Punic War, uses the words: repente hiemavit tempestas
And elsewhere, wishing to describe an exceptionally cold year, he says: totus hiemavit annus
And in another passage: inde sexaginta onerarias leves praeter militem et necessarios nautarum hiemante aquilone misit; and he continues to bolster many passages with this metaphor
In a certain place, Sallust gives the words: inter arma civilia aequi bonique famas petit; and Arruntius cannot restrain himself from mentioning at once, in the first book, that there were extensive "reminders" concerning Regulus

These and similar faults, which imitation stamps upon one's style, are not necessarily indications of loose standards or of debased mind; for they are bound to be personal and peculiar to the writer, enabling one to judge thereby of a particular author's temperament; just as an angry man will talk in an angry way, an excitable man in a flurried way, and an effeminate man in a style that is soft and unresisting
You note this tendency in those who pluck out, or thin out, their beards, or who closely shear and shave the upper lip while preserving the rest of the hair and allowing it to grow, or in those who wear cloaks of outlandish colours, who wear transparent togas, and who never deign to do anything which will escape general notice; they endeavour to excite and attract men's attention, and they put up even with censure, provided that they can advertise themselves
That is the style of Maecenas and all the others who stray from the path, not by hazard, but consciously and voluntarily
This is the result of great evil in the soul
As in the case of drink, the tongue does not trip until the mind is overcome beneath its load and gives way or betrays itself; so that intoxication of style – for what else than this can I call it? – never gives trouble to anyone unless the soul begins to totter
Therefore, I say, take care of the soul; for from the soul issue our thoughts, from the soul our words, from the soul our dispositions, our expressions, and our very gait
When the soul is sound and strong, the style too is vigorous, energetic, manly; but if the soul lose its balance, down comes all the rest in ruins

The soul is our king
If it be safe, the other functions remain on duty and serve with obedience; but the slightest lack of equilibrium in the soul causes them to waver along with it
And when the soul has yielded to pleasure, its functions and actions grow weak, and any undertaking comes from a nerveless and unsteady source
To persist in my use of this simile – our soul is at one time a king, at another a tyrant
The king, in that he respects things honourable, watches over the welfare of the body which is entrusted to his charge, and gives that body no base, no ignoble commands
But an uncontrolled, passionate, and effeminate soul changes kingship into that most dread and detestable quality – tyranny; then it becomes a prey to the uncontrolled emotions, which dog its steps, elated at first, to be sure, like a populace idly sated with a largess which will ultimately be its undoing, and spoiling what it cannot consume
But when the disease has gradually eaten away the strength, and luxurious habits have penetrated the marrow and the sinews, such a soul exults at the sight of limbs which, through its overindulgence, it has made useless; instead of its own pleasures, it views those of others; it becomes the go-between and witness of the passions which, as the result of self-gratification, it can no longer feel
Abundance of delights is not so pleasing a thing to that soul as it is bitter, because it cannot send all the dainties of yore down through the over-worked throat and stomach, because it can no longer whirl in the maze of eunuchs and mistresses, and it is melancholy because a great part of its happiness is shut off, through the limitations of the body

Now is it not madness, Lucilius, for none of us to reflect that he is mortal?
Or frail?
Or again that he is but one individual?
Look at our kitchens, and the cooks, who bustle about over so many fires; is it, think you, for a single belly that all this bustle and preparation of food takes place?
Look at the old brands of wine and store-houses filled with the vintages of many ages; is it, think you, a single belly that is to receive the stored wine, sealed with the names of so many consuls, and gathered from so many vineyards?
Look, and mark in how many regions men plough the earth, and how many thousands of farmers are tilling and digging; is it, think you, for a single belly that crops are planted in Sicily and Africa?
We should be sensible, and our wants more reasonable, if each of us were to take stock of himself, and to measure his bodily needs also, and understand how little he can consume, and for how short a time!
But nothing will give you so much help toward moderation as the frequent thought that life is short and uncertain here below; whatever you are doing, have regard to death
Farewell