The aim of this translation of some six hundred of theAdagia(II i 1 – II vi 100) is to present, as in the preceding volumes (cwe 31, 32), an English version of the final form of a steadily augmented and revised work as left by Erasmus in 1536 and published in theOpera omniaof 1540. (For the special problem of the Greek passages which constitute something of an anthology and for which Erasmus supplied Latin versions, see the Translator’s Foreword to cwe 31 xiv). The purpose of the notes is to identify the sources on which Erasmus...

Σπευδε βραδέως, Make haste slowly. This proverb has at first sight an agreeable touch of the riddle about it, made up as it is of contradictory words. It must therefore take its place in a particular class which I pointed out at the beginning¹ of this work – those which are expressed byenantiosis, the contrast of opposites, of whichδυσδαίμων ευδαιμονία, Infelix felicitas, Unhappy happiness, would be an example. And I should think it a reasonable guess, were someone to suppose that it started from that phrase in theKnightsof Aristophanes,² ‘Make haste with speed,’σπευδε ταχέως, that...