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3176. Nam tua res agitur paries quum proximus ardet: Et neglecta solent incendia sumere vires.

(L.) Hor. Ep. 1, 18, 84.

No time for sleeping with a fire next door;

Neglect such things, they only blaze the more.-Conington.

3177. Nascentes morimur, finisque ab origine pendet. (L.) Manil. Astr. 4, 16.-We are born but to die, and the end joins on to the beginning. Cf. Chaque instant de la vie est un pas vers la mort. (Fr.) Corn. Tite et Bérén. 1, 5.—Each moment of life is a step tow'rds the grave.

3178. Natales grate numeras? ignoscis amicis?

Lenior et melior fis accedente senecta?

(L.) Hor. Ep. 2, 2, 210.

Signs of improvement.

D'ye keep your birth-days thankfully, forgive,
Grow gentler, better, every day you live?-Ed.

3179. Natio comoda est. Rides? meliore cachinno
Concutitur: flet, si lacrymas conspexit amici,
Nec dolet. Igniculum brumæ si tempore poscas
Accipit endromidem: si dixeris, Estuo, sudat,
Non sumus ergo pares.
(L.) Juv. 3, 100.

Greeks.

The race are actors born. Smile, and your Greek
Will laugh until the tears run down his cheek.
He'll weep as soon, if he observe a friend

In tears, but feels no grief. For fire you send
In winter; straight his overcoat he gets:
And, if you cry, How hot it is, he sweats.
We are not therefore equal.—Ed.

3180. Natura abhorret vacuum. (L.)-Nature abhors a vacuum.
Dictum of Descartes, borrowed from the Peripatetic (Aristotle)
School, and originally employed to account for the rise of water in
a pump.
As far as is known, there is no vacuum in the material
universe, i.e., no part of its containing space is devoid of matter;
everything which is not a solid body being filled with the atmo-
sphere, beyond which exists a medium sufficient to disturb sensibly
the motion of the planets.

3181. Natura in operationibus suis non facit saltum. (L.)—Nature in her operations does not proceed by leaps. All is gradual, progressive.

This is quoted in La Vie et Mort du géant Theutobocus, 1613 (v. Fournier, Variétés hist. et littéraires): Cf. Linnæus, Philosoph. botan. 77 (1751), Natura non facit saltus.-Nature does not make leaps; and Leibnitz, Nouveaux Essais iv. 16 (1765), says: Tout va par degrés dans la nature, et rien par saut. (Fr.)—Everything proceeds gradually in nature, and never by leaps.

3182. Natura il fece, e poi roppe la stampa.

(It.) Ariost. Orl. Fur. 10, 79.

Nature broke the mould

In which she cast him, after fashioning

Her work.-Rose.

Said originally of Il duca di Roscia (? Duke of Rothesay), it has been applied to Raphael and others, as, e.g., by Lord Byron in his Monody on the Death of Sheridan, 117:

Sighing that nature formed but one such man,

And broke the die-in moulding Sheridan.

3183. Naturalia non sunt turpia. (L.)—What is natural is never shameful. Trans. of Eurip. (Fr. 863, p. 542, Dindorf), οὐκ αἰσχρὸν οὐδὲν τῶν ἀναγκαίων βροτοῖς.

3184. Naturam expellas furca tamen usque recurret.

(L.) Hor. Ep. 1, 10, 24.

Drive Nature out with might and main,
She's certain to return again.-Ed.

Destouches imitates it in his Glorieux, 3, 5:

Je ne le sais que trop :

Chassez le naturel, il revient au galop.

If you drive nature out, I know well to my pain,

She's sure to come back at full gallop again.-Ed.

(Fr.)

Frederick the Great (to Voltaire, 1771) applies the saying to prejudices: "Chassez les prejugés par la porte, ils rentreront par la fenêtre."

3185. Natus nemo. (L.) Plaut. Most. 2, 1, 55.- Not a living

soul.

3186. Naufragium in portu facere. (L.) Quint. Decl. 12, 23.To make shipwreck in port. To fail on the verge of

success.

3187. Naufragium rerum est mulier malefida marito. (L.)?—An unfaithful wife is the shipwreck of her husband's fortunes. 3188. Naviget Anticyram. (L.) Hor. S. 2, 3, 166.—Let him make a cruise to Anticyra. He's mad! to Bedlam with him! Hellebore, supposed to be good for hypochondria and insanity, was found at Anticyra, a town on the gulf of Corinth.

3189. Ne Æsopum quidem trivit. (L.) Prov.-He has not begun to thumb his Esop yet. He has not begun the most elementary manuals. A backward scholar.

3190. Nec aspera terrent. (L.)-Not even difficulties alarm us. Motto of the Hanoverian Guelphic Order: 3d Hussars: 8th, 14th, 23d (Welsh Fusiliers), 25th, and 27th Foot.

3191. Nec caput nec pedes. (L.) Prov.-Neither head nor tail. All confusion.

3192. Nec conjugis unquam

Prætendi tædas: aut hæc in fœdera veni. (L.) Virg. A. 4, 338.—I never pretended to be your husband, nor entered I into any such covenant as this.

Quoted in the form Non hæc in f. v. (in law and elsewhere), the words are used to repudiate alleged non-fulfilment of contracts, and to assert one's freedom from agreements never actually entered into. In reply to the propositions to which X. wishes me to accede, I can only say, non hæc in fœdera veni, These were no part of the original engagement.

3193. Nec cupias, nec metuas. (L.)-Neither desire nor fear. Motto of Earl of Hardwicke.

3194. Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus. (L.) Hor. A. P. 191.-Never bring in a god unless there be a knotty point absolutely requiring such a solution.

Advice to dramatic authors. Such an introduction was called a Deus ex machina (A god in a machine), i.e., some one who interposes at the last moment, to lend effective help at a critical juncture. 3195. Nec duo sunt, at forma duplex, nec femina dici

Nec puer ut possint, neutrumque et utrumque videntur.
(L.) Ov. M. 4, 378.-Nor are they two individuals, but
one with double shape: so that you can neither call it
man or woman, but they seem something of both. Motto
of Spectator 435 on ladies' masculine attire.

Both bodies in a single body mix,

A single body with a double sex.-Addison.

3196. Ne cede malis sed contra. (L.) Do not yield to misfortune but oppose it. Motto of Lord Garvagh and (first three words) Earl of Albemarle.

3197. Necesse est cum insanientibus furere, nisi solus relinqueris. (L.) Petr. Arb. ?—With mad people you must be mad unless you wish to be left alone.

3198. Necessitas non habet legem. (L.)—Necessity has no law. 3199. Nec facile invenias multis e millibus unum

Virtutem pretium qui putet esse sui.

Ipse decor, recte facti si præmia desint,
Non movet, et gratis pœnitet esse probum.

(L.) Ov. Ep. 2, 3, 11.

To find one in a thousand it is hard

Who reckons virtue as its own reward:

E'en honour fails unless it's dearly bought,

For people grudge to be upright for naught.-Ed.

3200. Nec habeo, nec careo, nec curo.

I have not, want not, care

not. Bowstring-makers' Company.

3201. Nec loquor hæc, quia sit major prudentia nobis ;

Sed sim, quam medico, notior ipse mihi. (L.) Ov. Ep. 1, 3, 91.—I do not say this because I have any great powers of foresight, but because I know myself better than my doctor does.

3202. Nec lusisse pudet, sed non incidere ludum.

Wild oats.

(L.) Hor. Ep. 1, 14, 36.

No shame I count it to have had my sport,

The shame is not to cut such follies short.-Ed.

3203. Nec male notus eques. (L.) A knight of good repute. Motto of Viscount Southwell.

3204. Nec meus audet

Rem tentare pudor, quam vires ferre recusent.

(L.) Virg. G. 3, 78.

Nor will my modesty the effort dare

Which my unaided powers decline to bear.-Ed.

3205. Nec meus hic sermo est, sed quæ præcepit Ofella. (L.) Hor. S. 2, 2, 2.-These ideas are not mine, but what Ofella told me.

3206. Nec minor est virtus, quam quærere, parta tueri :

Casus inest illic, hic erit artis opus. (L.) Ov. A. A. 2, 13. 'Tis no small art to keep what you've acquired:

Chance lies in one, for th' other skill's required.-Ed.

3207. Nec mora, nec requies. (L.) Virg. G. 3, 110.-No delay, no rest. No intermission was allowed, the matter was urged on with all possible dispatch.

3208. Nec morti esse locum. (L.) Virg. ?—There is no place for death. The poet here expresses his belief, that after their dissolution in this world, all things revert to God. Cf. Longfellow, Resignation, "There is no death: what seems so is transition."

3209. Nec multo opus est nec diu.

(L.)

Sen. Q. N. 3, Præf.

-Man wants but little, nor that little long. Young,
Night Thoughts, 14, 118. Cf. Goldsmith's Hermit,

st. 8:

Man wants but little here below
Nor wants that little long.

3210. Nec nos obniti contra, nec tendere tantum Sufficimus; superat quoniam fortuna sequamur, Quoque vocat vertamus iter.

Nor can we struggle or resist ;

(L.) Virg. A. 5, 21.

Come, let us bow to fortune's sway,

And, as she beckons, shape our way.-Conington.

3211. Nec pietas ulla est velatum sæpe videri

(L.)

Vortier ad lapidem, atque omnes accedere ad aras.
Lucret. 5, 1198.-That is not piety, to be often seen bending
with veiled head before the statue of the god, and to visit
all the altars.

3212. Nec pluribus impar. (L.)-Sufficient for many.

Assumed as his motto by Louis XIV. (or rather invented for him by Douvrier the herald), with the Sun for emblem; but the words had already been adopted more than a century before by Philip II., who as King of Spain and the Indies had a better right to speak in the character of the sun shining equally over more realms than

one.

3213. Nec pluteum cædit, nec demorsos sapit ungues. (L.) Pers. 1, 106.-It does not smack of the desk, or bitten nails. Said of insipid poetry, composed without care and labour. 3214. Nec prece nec pretio. (L.)-Neither by entreaty nor by bribe. Motto of Lord Bateman and Lord Cottesloe.

3215. Nec, quæ præteriit, iterum revocabitur unda,

Nec, quæ præteriit, hora redire potest.

(L.) Ov. A. A. 3, 63.

Irrevocable Time.

The wave that's passed you, is recalled in vain :

And time once vanished ne'er returns again.-Ed.

3216. Nec quærere nec spernere honorem. (L.)—Neither to seek nor to despise honours. Motto of Viscount Bolingbroke.

3217. Nec requies erat ulla mali: defessa jacebant

Corpora: mussabat tacito medicina timore. (L.) Lucret. vi. 1177.—No respite was there of ill: their bodies would lie quite spent. The healing art muttered low in voiceless fear. Said of the plague in Egypt which baffled all medical skill.

3218. Nec scire fas est omnia. (L.) Hor. C. 4, 4, 22.—It is not permitted us to know all things.

3219. Nec sibi cœnarum quivis temere arroget artem

Non prius exacta tenui ratione saporum.

(L.) Hor. S. 2, 4, 35.

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