Stobaeus, Volume II

Name: Stobaeus, Volume II
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

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Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 46 · II.46.18–II.46.19

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Facing Pages · Branch 515 of 516

Book II Chapter 46 · II.46.18–II.46.19

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Ancient Greek

p. 1026

Ἐκ τῶν Ὑψαίου ὑποθηκῶν περὶ τοῦ εὐεργετεῖν

II.46.18

Οὐδένα μισήσεις ὡς ἀχάριστον, ἐὰν ὡς ἀληθῶς χαρίζῃ.

II.46.18a

Τοὺς μηδεμίαν ὧν ἂν εὖ πάθωσιν ὑπὸ σοῦ χάριν ἐκτίνοντας ἄλλοι λεγέτωσαν ἀχαρίστους, σὺ δ’ ἀνοήτους, ὅτι τοῦ καλλίστου τῶν ἀγαθῶν οὐ συνιᾶσιν.

II.46.19

Εἰκότως οἱ νομοθέται μόνης ἀχαριστίας δίκας οὐχ ὁρίζουσιν, ὡς τοῦ μὲν εὖ ποιοῦντος τὴν μεγίστην ἀμοιβὴν ἐν οἷς ἔτυχεν εὖ ποιῶν ἀπειληφότος, τοῦ δὲ ἀχαρίστου τὴν ἀξίαν τίνοντος δίκην ἐν ᾧ λανθάνει τῷ μεγίστῳ κακῷ συνεχόμενος, ἀχαριστίᾳ.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 46

p. 1027

From Hypsaeus’s Counsels on Doing Good

II.46.18

You will hate no one for being ungrateful if you truly do someone a kindness.¹⁵³²

II.46.18a

Let others call ungrateful those who make no return for whatever benefits they receive from you; you call them foolish, because they do not understand the finest of good things.¹⁵³³

II.46.19

Lawgivers reasonably prescribe no penalties for ingratitude alone, because the person who does good has received his greatest reward in the very good he happens to have done.¹⁵³⁴ The ungrateful person, meanwhile, pays the penalty he deserves in being held fast, without realizing it, by the greatest evil—ingratitude.¹⁵³⁵

1532.The heading identifies counsels or instructions on doing good. The condition if you truly do someone a kindness is essential: the saying links genuine beneficence with freedom from hatred of the recipient.

1533.Wachsmuth marks this as a separate excerpt, 18a, without adding a new attribution. Its contrast is between calling someone ungrateful and regarding him as lacking understanding. The finest of good things is not further named in this sentence.

1534.The argument places the benefactor’s reward in the good deed itself, rather than making it depend on repayment by the recipient.

1535.Λανθάνει retains the ungrateful person’s lack of awareness of his own condition. The passage treats ingratitude itself as a penalty; II.46.22, by contrast, introduces judicial punishment. The anthology preserves both accounts.

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.