Today's Latin Reading From Quintilian, "Institutio Oratoria" 1.1

     I have begin reading Marcus Fabius Quintilianus' ("Quintilian's," in the more familiar English form) Institutio Oratoria, "The Orator's Education," as an especially relevant author and work as I am, at the moment, engaged in raising a two-year-old and a newborn, in addition to my two teenage stepsons (and I have been an educator for about 18 years now). Quintilian's work is especially interesting because although it is meant to be a guide to raising and teaching an "orator," the hidden assumption is that all citizens of a certain class are to be "orators," that it is simply the education that all well-educated citizens have, rather than a certain subset or profession. Many of the remarks are therefore general remarks on raising children. 

     I reproduce the first paragraph of the first chapter here in its entirety:

     Igitur nato filio pater spem de illo primum quam optimam capiat: ita diligentior a principiis fiet. Falsa enim est querela, paucissimis hominibus vim percipiendi quae tradantur esse concessam, plerosque vero laborem ac tempora tarditate ingenii perdere. Nam contra plures reperias et faciles in excogitando et ad discendum promptos. Quippe id est homini naturale, ac sicut aves ad volatum, equi ad cursum, ad saevitiam ferae gignuntur, ita nobis propria est mentis agitando atque sollertia: unde origo animi caelestis creditur. Hebetes vero et indociles non magis secundum naturam hominis eduntur quam prodigiosa corpora et monstris insignia (sed hi pauci admodum fuerunt). Argumentum, quod in pueris elucet spes plurimorum: quae cum emorietur aetate, manifestum est non naturam defescisse sed curam. 'Praestat tamen ingenio alius alium.' Concedo; sed plus efficiet aut minus: nemo reperitur qui sit studio nihil consecutus Hoc qui perviderit, protinus ut erit parens factus, acrem quam maxime datur curam spei futuri oratoris inpendat. 

Roughly in English:

     "As soon as his son is born, then, a father should take up the highest possible expectation concerning him: thus the father will be more diligent about his son from the beginning. For it is a false complaint that the power of understanding all that is taught to them is granted to only the smallest number of human beings, and that most by their slowness of wit truly waste the time and trouble spent teaching them. For on the contrary, you would find many more are easy in their reasoning and prompt in their learning. Indeed, this is natural to a human being, just as birds are to flying, horses to running, and wild beasts to ferocity, so for us the exercise of the mind and resourcefulness: thus the origin of the human soul is believed to be divine. Truly, the dull and unteachable are no more natural products of human nature than are prodigious bodies and those marked as monsters (but these have always been few). The proof, that the hope of many achievements shines forth in children: and when it dies away with age, this is manifestly the failure not of nature but of care. 'But one displays more inborn talent than another!" I concede this; but while one will achieve more or less, no one is found who achieves nothing by their efforts. The parent who entirely understands this, then, must give the matter the keenest possible attention as soon as they become a parent, that they foster the promise of the future orator [and as I remarked above, for "orator" I feel one can simply read "informed and active citizen" for purposes of our common understanding]."

On Fatherhood, from Terence's "The Brothers"

     Yesterday, I was late in doing my daily Latin reading, so I picked up my Loeb Classical Library Reader at the end of the day and flipped it open past the Greek selections to the first Latin selection, a bit from "The Brothers" by Publius Terentius Afer (better known in English as "Terence"). The selection includes the following in a speech from the character Micio:

hoc patriumst, potius consuefacere filium

sua sponte recte facere quam alieno metu:

hoc pater et dominus interest. hoc qui nequit,

fateatur necire imperare liberis.

Roughly in English, this is :

"It is the task of fathers to make a son accustomed

to act rightly of his own accord, rather than by external fear:

That is the difference between a father and a master. He who denies this

Should admit that he does not know how to manage children."

     As I am both a stepfather and a foster father, and at the moment I am father to no less than four boys, this struck me as quite relevant, and a nice passage to find through random happenstance.