Stobaeus, Volume II

Name: Stobaeus, Volume II
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

Explore the Lexicon

Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 31 · II.31.9–II.31.11

Swipe or use the arrow keys.

English Page · Branch 377 of 516

Book II Chapter 31 · II.31.9–II.31.11

Book Mode

Ancient Greek

p. 750

Ἀντιφάνους

II.31.9

Τὸ γὰρ πεπαιδεῦσθαι, μόνον ἄν τις τοῦτ’ ἔχῃ, ἀληθές ἐστι καὶ τὸ ⟨τῶν⟩ ἀδικημάτων μὴ λαμβάνειν τὰς ἀξίας τιμωρίας, ἐλεεῖν δὲ πάντως.

Παροιμία

II.31.10

Μελέτη χρονισθεῖσ’ εἰς φύσιν καθίσταται.

Ἀλέξιδος

II.31.11

Ὦ παῖ, μέγιστος ἔρανός ἐστί μοι τὸ σὲ θρέψαι κατὰ τρόπον· ὃν γὰρ αὐτὸς ἀπέλαβον παρὰ τοῦ πατρός, δεῖ τοῦτον ἀποδοῦναί με σοί.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 31

p. 751

Antiphanes

II.31.9

For being truly educated, if one has only this,¹⁰⁸⁰ also means not to exact the deserved penalties for ⟨the⟩ wrongs, but to show mercy in every case.¹⁰⁸¹

Proverb

II.31.10

Practice, with time, becomes nature.¹⁰⁸²

Alexis

II.31.11

Child, bringing you up properly is my greatest contribution;¹⁰⁸³ for what I myself received from my father I must repay to you.¹⁰⁸⁴

1080.The heading names Antiphanes without identifying a play or speaker. The opening is compressed, especially the parenthesis if one has only this. Wachsmuth retains ἀληθές, true, while recording its disputed status. The English preserves the claim about true education without replacing the adjective by a proposed alternative or supplying a lost comic context.

1081.Supplied ⟨τῶν⟩ is marked as ⟨the⟩. Here taking the penalties is understood as exacting punishment, in contrast with showing mercy. The excerpt does not restrict its wrongs to a particular kind or reduce πάντως, in every case, to an occasional recommendation. Its isolated comic voice should not simply be treated as Antiphanes’s personal doctrine.

1082.Μελέτη is practice or repeated exercise, and χρονισθεῖσα indicates its continuation over time. Nature renders φύσις: the line describes an acquired practice becoming settled in someone. The source labels it a proverb, rather than attributing it here to a named tragedian. The same verse occurs at II.7.11m.1, supporting the reported view that training can contribute to aptitude for virtue.

1083.Alexis is named without a play or dramatic speaker. Ἔρανος can mean a contribution, a loan, or a favor to be returned; here it supplies a financial image for upbringing. Κατὰ τρόπον means properly or in the fitting manner. The metaphor does not establish the details of a legal loan.

1084.The recipient of the repayment is the child addressed, σοί, not the speaker’s own father. What the speaker received from that father is returned through care for the next generation. The shift of recipient is part of the verse’s image, rather than a debt the child is being asked to repay.

About This Reading Edition

The complete surviving text of Stobaeus’s second book, through II.46.22, in Ancient Greek and English, with an introduction and 1,541 explanatory notes. All forty-six chapter headings remain, including the notices for chapters whose texts are missing.

Historical Text and Translation

Greek: Curt Wachsmuth, Ioannis Stobaei Anthologii libri duo priores, volumen II (Berlin: Weidmann, 1884), printed p. 1 and pp. 3–264. The supplied edition preserves consequential editorial signs, reconstructed joins, qualified attributions, and missing-text notices. English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes: Diotimos Editions, 2026.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 edition are in the public domain. The supplied English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are published with the site owner’s authorization.