- Play by Aristophanes
- It is in GB Volume 5.
- People in the play: Cario - servant of Chremylus, Chremylus, Plutus - God of Wealth, Blepsidemus, Poverty, Wife of Chremylus, Chorus of Needy Agriculturists, A Good Man, An Informer, An Old Lady, A Youth, Hermes, A Priest of Zeus
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The Plutus - Readwise Highlights
Metadata
- Author: Aristophanes
- Full Title: The Plutus
- Category: articles
- URL: https://readwise.io/reader/document_raw_content/273523539
Highlights
- If, changing all his habits, he should turn A rogue, dishonest, rotten to the core. For such as they, methinks, succeed the best. (View Highlight)
- For we who see should go before the blind, (View Highlight)
- Not for myself, the quiver of my life Is well-nigh emptied of its arrows now But for my son, my only son, (View Highlight)
- ‘Twas Zeus that caused it, jealous of mankind. For, when a little chap, I used to brag I’d visit none except the wise and good And orderly; he therefore made me blind, That I might ne’er distinguish which was which, So jealous is he always of the good (View Highlight)
- And whatsoever in the world is bright, And fair, and graceful, all is done for thee. For every mortal thing subserves to Wealth. (View Highlight)
- They all say that; but when in sober earnest They find they’ve got me, and are wealthy men, They place no limit on their evil ways. (View Highlight)
- And every art existing in the world, And every craft, was for thy sake invented. For thee one sits and cobbles all the day, One works in bronze, another works in wood, One fuses gold—the gold derived from thee (View Highlight)
- Aye, everything that’s done is done for thee. Thou art alone, thyself alone, the source Of all our fortunes, good and bad alike. ‘Tis so in war ; wherever he alights, That side is safe the victory to win. (View Highlight)
- To enter in beneath a stranger’s roof. I never got the slightest good from that. Was it a miser’s house; the miser straight Would dig a hole and pop me underground; And if some worthy neighbour came to beg A little silver for his urgent needs, Would vow he’d never seen me in his life. (View Highlight)
- Of all things else a man may have too much, Of love, Of loaves, Of literature, Of Sweets, Of honour, Cheesecakes, Manliness, Dried figs, Ambition, Barley-meal, Command, Pea soup. But no man ever has enough of thee (View Highlight)
- For give a man a sum of thirteen talents, And all the more he hungers for sixteen; Give him sixteen, and he must needs have forty Or life’s not worth his living, so he says. (View Highlight)
- There’s nothing sound or honest in the world, The love of money overcomes us all. (View Highlight)
- Is there a doctor now in all the town ? There are no fees, and therefore there’s no skill. (View Highlight)
- But this is Poverty herself, you rogue, The most destructive pest in all the world. (View Highlight)
- the honest and true should enjoy, as their due, a successful and happy career, Whilst the lot of the godless and wicked should fall in exactly the opposite sphere. (View Highlight)
- if Wealth should allot himself equally out (assume that his sight ye restore), Then none would to science his talents devote or practise a craft any more. Yet if science and art from the world should depart, pray whom would ye get for the future To build you a ship, or your leather to snip, or to make you a wheel or a suture ? Do ye think that a man will be likely to tan, or a smithy or laundry to keep, Or to break up the soil with his ploughshare, and toil the fruits of Demeter to reap, If regardless of these he can dwell at his ease, a life without labour enjoying ? (View Highlight)
- 1 sit like a Mistress, by Poverty’s lash constraining the needy mechanic; When I raise it, to earn his living he’ll turn, and work in a terrible panic. (View Highlight)
- Decorum abides with those whom I visit; that mine Are the modest and orderly folk, and that Wealth’s are “with insolence flushed and with wine.” (View Highlight)
- So children, we see, from their parents will flee who would teach them the way they should go. So hardly we learn what is right to discern so few what is best for them know. (View Highlight)
- ‘Twere better, I’m sure, to be honest and poor, than rich and so stingy and screwing. (View Highlight)
- then the God clucked, And out there issued from the holy shrine Two great enormous serpents. (View Highlight)
- Then, glancing upwards, I behold the priest Whipping the cheese-cakes and the figs from off The holy table; thence he coasted round To every altar, spying what was left. (View Highlight)
- How pleasant ‘tis to lead a prosperous life, And that, expending nothing of one’s own. Into this house a heap of golden joys Has hurled itself though nothing wrong we’ve done. Truly a sweet and pleasant thing is wealth. (View Highlight)
- the nuisance these friends are, Emerging suddenly when fortune smiles. (View Highlight)
- Whom I had succoured in their need, would now Be glad to help me when in need myself. But all slipped off as though they saw me not. (View Highlight)
- now he’s rich He cares for broth no longer, though before, When he was poor, he snapped up anything. (View Highlight)
- But, howsoever, as you drank the wine, You should, in justice, also drink the dregs. (View Highlight)
- When men had nothing, one, a merchant saved From voyage-perils, one, escaped from law, Would come and sacrifice; or else at home Perform his vows, and summon me, the priest. But not a soul comes now, or body either, Except a lot of chaps to do their needs. (View Highlight)