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 15 · II.15.14–II.15.16

Swipe or use the arrow keys.

Ancient Greek Page · Branch 351 of 516

Book II Chapter 15 · II.15.14–II.15.16

Book Mode

Ancient Greek

p. 698

Ἴωνος

II.15.14

Ἐκ τῶν λόγων μὴ κρίνε, Κλεινοφῶν, σοφὸν ἢ χρηστὸν ἄνδρα, τὸν βίον ἐξέταζ’ ἀεί· πολλοὶ γὰρ ⟨εὖ⟩ λέγουσιν ἀδικίας χάριν, τὰ δ’ ἔργ’ ἔχουσι φαῦλα, κοὐ φρονοῦσιν εὖ.

Εὐριπίδου Παλαμήδῃ

II.15.15

Ὅστις λέγει μὲν εὖ, τὰ δ’ ἔργ’ ἐφ’ οἷς λέγει αἰσχρ’ ἐστί, τούτου τὸ σοφὸν οὐκ αἰνῶ ποτέ.

Σοφοκλέους

II.15.16

Σύ τοι λέγεις νιν, οὐκ ἐγώ· σὺ γὰρ ποιεῖς τοὔργον, τὰ δ’ ἔργα τοὺς λόγους εὑρίσκεται.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 15

p. 699

Ion

II.15.14

Do not judge a man wise or good from his words, Kleinophon;⁹⁹⁰ always examine his life. For many speak ⟨well⟩ for the sake of injustice, while their deeds are base, and they do not think well.⁹⁹¹

Euripides, Palamedes

II.15.15

When a man speaks well but the deeds he speaks about are shameful, I never praise his cleverness.⁹⁹²

Sophocles, Electra

II.15.16

You are the one saying it, not I: for you do the deed, and deeds find their own words.⁹⁹³

990.The printed heading gives Ion, but the attribution is uncertain. Wachsmuth cross-references the fragment under Philemon; his apparatus discusses Philistion and a possible Moschion. The bare heading is retained without identifying a particular Ion or assigning the verses securely to another poet.

991.The adverb ⟨εὖ⟩, well, is an editorial supplement. The printed address is Κλεινοφῶν, Kleinophon; the apparatus records the more usual Κλειτοφῶν, Kleitophon. Βίος, life, directs attention to sustained conduct, with the final verse contrasting polished speech and actual deeds.

992.The heading assigns the fragment to Euripides’ Palamedes without identifying its speaker. Τὸ σοφόν is cleverness or intellectual skill here: the speaker refuses to praise eloquence associated with shameful conduct.

993.Sophocles, Electra 624–625. Electra answers her mother Clytemnestra, who has complained that her own words and deeds provoke Electra’s accusations. Electra makes conduct responsible for the language used about it; deeds are imagined finding their own verbal expression.

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.