Wider Ancient Witness Archive · 4.2 Greek and Greco-Roman Moral Wisdom Background Archive
Layer 4 — Wider Archive
Theognis — Select Wisdom
This text is included as a comparative, historical, philosophical, ritual, textual, or fragmentary witness. It is not presented as part of the Restored Bible.
Theognis — Select Wisdom
[Elegiac couplets of counsel, addressed to the young Cyrnus; a selection.]
Cyrnus, let a seal be set upon these my words;
they will not be stolen unmarked, nor the good in them exchanged for worse;
and everyone will say, These are the verses of Theognis of Megara.
Take counsel twice and three times over what comes before your mind;
for the rash man falls headlong into ruin.
No man takes with him to the house of the dead his stored-up wealth;
no ransom frees a man from death, or from grievous disease, or the coming of old age.
Wine drunk past measure is an evil; but if one drinks it with knowledge,
it is no evil but a good.
Hard it is to deceive an enemy, Cyrnus;
but easy for a friend to deceive a friend.
Nurture no bad man as you would a comrade in distress;
you will get no thanks for the good you do him.
It is easier to beget and rear a man than to put good sense in him;
no one has yet devised a way to make the foolish wise.
In a just man’s heart, Cyrnus, lies the whole of virtue;
and every good man is just.