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Link to an image of this page  Link to an image of this page  [o2r p211]

Vino prudentiam augeri.[1]

Wisdom increased by wine.

LXXIIII [=75] .

Haec Bacchus pater, & Pallas communiter ambo
Templa tenent: soboles utraque vera Iovis:
Haec caput, ille femur solvit:[2] huic usus olivi
Debitus, invenit primus at ille merum.
Iunguntur merito. qụd si qui abstemius odit
Vina, deae nullum sentiet auxilium.

This temple Father Bacchus and Pallas both possess in common, each of them the true off-spring of Jove: she split Jove’s head, he his thigh. To her we owe the use of the olive; but he first discovered wine. They are rightly joined together, because if anyone in abstinence hates wine, he will know no help from the goddess.

Notes:

1.  This emblem uses material from Anthologia Graeca, 16.183, concerning a statue of Bacchus beside one of Pallas Athene.

2.  Haec caput, ille femur solvit, ‘she split Jove’s head, he his thigh’. For the birth of Pallas Athene from the head of Jove and of Bacchus from his thigh, see emblems 1 ([A56a001]), and 25 ([A56a025]). Pallas is the virgin goddess, patroness of intellectual pursuits, who presented Athens with the gift of the olive tree. Bacchus discovered the vine during his wanderings about the earth and taught men its use. He also introduced various other features of civilisation.

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    Link to an image of this page  Link to an image of this page  [o1r p209]

    Aemulatio impar.

    Competing on unequal terms

    LXVIII [=69] .

    Altivolam miluus comitatur degener harpam, [1]
    Et praedae partem saepe cadentis habet.
    Mullum prosequitur qui spretas sargus ab illo, [2]
    Praeteritasque avidus devorat ore dapes.
    Sic mecum Oenocrates agit: at deserta studentum
    Utitur hoc lippo curia tanquam oculo.[3]

    An ignoble kite accompanies the soaring hawk and often gets a piece of the prey as it falls. The sargus follows the mudfish and greedily devours the food that it scorns and passes by. Oenocrates behaves like this with me - but the lecture-hall I’ve abandoned treats him like a runny eye.

    Notes:

    1.  For the association of the kite and the hawk see Aristotle, Historia animalium, 9.1.609.

    2.  For the sargus see Emblem 29 ([A56a029]). For its habit of following the lutarius (the mudfish) and eating the food it disturbs as it burrows in the mud, see Pliny, Natural History, 9.30.65; Erasmus, Parabolae, p. 253.

    3.  lippo...tamquam oculo, ‘like a runny eye’, a proverbial expression. See Erasmus, Adagia, 4100 (Lippo oculo similis): a runny eye is something you would prefer to be rid of, but while you have it you cannot leave it alone; similarly there are people you do not like, but you find yourself obliged to make use of them.

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