Book 1, Chapter 6
Original Latin
Adeone me delirare censes, ut ista esse credam?
An tu haec non credis?
Minime vero.
Male hercule narras.
Cur? quaeso.
Quia disertus esse possem, si contra ista dicerem.
Quis enim non in eius modi causa? aut quid negotii est haec poëtarum et pictorum portenta convincere?
11 Atqui pleni libri sunt contra ista ipsa disserentium philosophorum.
Inepte sane. quis enim est tam excors, quem ista moveant?
Si ergo apud inferos miseri non sunt, ne sunt quidem apud inferos ulli.
Ita prorsus existimo.
Ubi sunt ergo i, quos miseros dicis, aut quem locum incolunt? si enim sunt, nusquam esse non possunt.
Ego vero nusquam esse illos puto.
Igitur ne esse quidem?
Prorsus isto modo, et tamen miseros ob id ipsum quidem, quia nulli sint.
12 Iam mallem Cerberum metueres quam ista tam inconsiderate diceres.
Quid tandem?
Quem esse negas, eundem esse dicis. ubi est acumen tuum? cum enim miserum esse dicis, tum eum qui non sit dicis esse.
Non sum ita hebes, ut istud dicam.
Quid dicis igitur?
Miserum esse verbi causa M. Crassum, qui illas fortunas morte dimiserit, miserum Cn. Pompeium, qui tanta gloria sit orbatus, omnis denique miseros, qui hac luce careant.
Revolveris eodem. sint enim oportet, si miseri sunt; tu autem modo negabas eos esse, qui mortui essent. Si igitur non sunt, nihil possunt esse; ita ne miseri quidem sunt.
Non dico fortasse etiam, quod sentio; nam istuc ipsum, non esse, cum fueris, miserrimum puto.
Quid?
13 miserius quam omnino numquam fuisse? ita, qui nondum nati sunt, miseri iam sunt, quia non sunt, et nos, si post mortem miseri futuri sumus, miseri fuimus ante quam nati. ego autem non commemini, ante quam sum natus, me miserum; tu si meliore memoria es, velim scire, ecquid de te recordere.
Musean translation
Complete machine-assisted translation from the Latin. Latin transcription by the Perseus Project, Trustees of Tufts University, CC BY-SA 4.0.
“Do you think me so deranged that I believe those things exist?”
“Then you do not believe them?”
“Certainly not.”
“By Hercules, that is bad news.”
“Why, may I ask?”
“Because I could be eloquent if I were arguing against them.”
“Who could not, in a case like that? What difficulty is there in refuting these monsters of poets and painters?”
11 “And yet whole books of philosophers argue against just these things.”
“Foolishly enough. Who is so mindless as to be troubled by them?”
“Then if there are no miserable people in the underworld, there are no people in the underworld at all.”
“That is precisely what I think.”
“Where, then, are those you call miserable? What place do they inhabit? If they exist, they cannot be nowhere.”
“But I think they are nowhere.”
“Then they do not even exist?”
“Exactly so; and yet they are miserable for that very reason, because they do not exist.”
12 “I would now rather you were afraid of Cerberus than speak so thoughtlessly.”
“How so?”
“You say that the very person whose existence you deny exists. Where is your sharpness of mind? When you say that someone is miserable, you are saying that someone who does not exist does exist.”
“I am not so dull as to say that.”
“What do you say, then?”
“That Marcus Crassus, for example, is miserable because death deprived him of his great wealth; that Gnaeus Pompey is miserable because he was stripped of such glory; in short, that everyone deprived of this daylight is miserable.”
“You return to the same point. They must exist if they are miserable; but just now you denied that the dead exist. If, then, they do not exist, they cannot be anything; and so they cannot be miserable either.”
“Perhaps I am still not saying what I mean. What I consider most miserable is precisely this: not to exist after having existed.”
“What?
13 “More miserable than never to have existed at all? Then those not yet born are miserable already, because they do not exist; and if we are to be miserable after death, we were miserable before we were born. I, however, do not remember being miserable before I was born. If your memory is better, I should like to know whether you recall anything about yourself.”
Plain English translation
Complete independent machine-assisted translation directly from the Latin. Latin transcription by the Perseus Project, Trustees of Tufts University, CC BY-SA 4.0.
“Do you think I’m so crazy that I’d believe those things exist?”
“You don’t believe them?”
“Certainly not.”
“Well, that’s bad news, by Hercules.”
“Why, please?”
“Because I could make an eloquent speech against them.”
“Who couldn’t, on a subject like that? What’s so hard about showing that these monsters invented by poets and painters aren’t real?”
11 “Yet philosophers have filled whole books with arguments against just those things.”
“How silly of them. Who’s so mindless that those things bother them?”
“Then if there aren’t any unhappy people in the underworld, there aren’t any people there at all.”
“That’s exactly what I think.”
“So where are these people you call unhappy? What place do they live in? If they exist, they can’t be nowhere.”
“I think they’re nowhere at all.”
“Then they don’t even exist?”
“That’s exactly it. And yet they’re unhappy precisely because they don’t exist.”
12 “I’d rather you were afraid of Cerberus than spoke as thoughtlessly as that.”
“What do you mean?”
“You say the same person both doesn’t exist and does. Where’s your sharp thinking? When you say someone is unhappy, you’re saying that a person who doesn’t exist does exist.”
“I’m not so dull that I’d say that.”
“Then what are you saying?”
“That Marcus Crassus, for example, is unhappy because death took away his riches, that Gnaeus Pompey is unhappy because he’s been stripped of such glory—in short, that everyone who’s lost the light of life is unhappy.”
“You’re going back to the same point. They must exist if they’re unhappy. But you just denied that dead people exist. So if they don’t exist, they can’t be anything. That means they can’t be unhappy either.”
“Perhaps I’m not saying what I mean. What I think is most unhappy is just that: not to exist when you once did.”
“What?
13 “More unhappy than never to have existed at all? Then people who haven’t been born yet are already unhappy, because they don’t exist. And if we’re going to be unhappy after death, we were unhappy before we were born. I don’t remember being unhappy before I was born. If your memory’s better, I’d like to know whether you remember anything about yourself.”
About this section
Book 1, Chapter 6 is part of Tusculan Disputations by Marcus Tullius Cicero. This page sets the Latin original beside 2 direct-source translations, so any line can be checked against the source. It is part 6 of 189 in the work, which is kept in the Roman tradition.
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