[Editor: This is a chapter from The Eureka Stockade by Raffaello Carboni. A glossary has been provided to explain various words and phrases that may be unfamiliar to modern readers.]
THE EUREKA STOCKADE.
I.
Favete linguis.
Mendacium sibi, sicut turbinis, viam augustam in urbe et orbe terrarum aperuit.
Stultus dicit in corde suo, “non est Deus.”
Veritas vero lente passu passu sicut puer, tandem aliquando janunculat ad lucem.
Tunc justus ut palma florescit.*
I undertake to do what an honest man should do, let it thunder or rain. He who buys this book to lull himself to sleep had better spend his money in grog. He who reads this book to smoke a pipe over it, let him provide himself with Plenty of tobacco — he will have to blow hard. A lover of truth — that’s the man I want — and he will have in this book the truth, and nothing but the truth.
Facts, from the “stubborn-things” store, are here retailed and related — contradiction is challenged from friend or foe. The observation on, and induction from the facts, are here stamped with sincerity: I ask for no other credit. I may be mistaken: I will not acknowledge the mistake unless the contrary be proved.
When two boys are see-sawing on a plank, balanced on its centre, whilst the world around them is “up” with the one it is “down” with the other. The centre, however, is stationary. I was in the centre. I was an actor, and therefore an eye-witness. The events I relate, I did see them pass before me. The persons I speak of, I know them face to face. The words I quote, I did hear them with my own ears. Others may know more or less than I; I mean to tell all that I know, and nothing more.
Two reasons counsel me to undertake the task of publishing this work; but a third reason is at the bottom of it, as the potent lever; and they are —
1st. An honourable ambition urging me to have my name remembered among the illustrious of Rome. I have, on reaching the fortieth year of my age, to publish a work at which I have been plodding the past eighteen years. An ocean of grief would overwhelm me if then I had to vindicate my character: how, under the hospitality of the British flag, I was put in the felon’s dock of a British Supreme Court to be tried for high treason.
2nd. I have the moral courage to show the truth of my text above, because I believe in the resurrection of life.
3rd. Brave comrades in arms who fell on that disgraced Sabbath morning, December 3rd, worthy of a better fate, and most certainly of a longer remembrance, it is in my power to drag your names from an ignoble oblivion, and vindicate the unrewarded bravery of one of yourselves! He was once my mate, the bearer of our standard, the “Southern Cross.” Shot down by a murderous hand, he fell and died struggling like a man in the cause of the diggers. But he was soon forgotten. That he was buried is known by the tears of a few true friends! the place of his burial is little known, and less cared for.
Sunt tempora nostra; non mutabimur nec mutamur in illis ; jam perdidi spem.
The work will be published on the 1st of December next, and given to each subscriber by the Author’s own hand, on the site of the Eureka Stockade, from the rising to the setting of the sun, on the memorable third.
*Listen to me —
The lie, like the whirlwind, clears itself a royal road, either in town or country, through the whole face of the earth.
The fool in his heart says, “There is no God.”
The truth, however slow, step by step, like a little child, someday, at last, finds a footpath to light.
Then the righteous flourish like a palm tree.
Source:
Raffaello Carboni. The Eureka Stockade: The Consequence of Some Pirates Wanting on Quarter-Deck a Rebellion, Public Library of South Australia, Adelaide, 1962 [facsimile of the 1855 edition], pages 1-2
Editor’s notes:
favete linguis = (Latin) “favour by your tongues” (i.e. “hold your tongue” or “keep silent”); from Odes, Book 3, section I (line 2), by Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus, 65 BC – 8 BC) [Carboni uses line 1, “odi profanum vulgus et arceo”, in chapters 8, 16 and 52]
*sunt tempora nostra; non mutabimur nec mutamur in illis ; jam perdidi spem = (Latin) “there are times of ours; does not change nor change with them; already lost my hope” (*rough translation) [Carboni uses the phrase “sunt tempora nostra” in chapters I (1), LXXXIX (89), XCVIII (98), and C (100)]
Carboni’s introductory paragraph:
(Latin) (*rough translation) [see Carboni’s translation above]
*Mendacium sibi, sicut turbinis, viam augustam in urbe et orbe terrarum aperuit. = “A lie to another, as of a whirlwind, the way of august in the city over the world, and opened it.”
Stultus dicit in corde suo, “non est Deus.” = “The fool has said in his heart, There is no God” from Psalm 13:1 in the Latin Vulgate Bible [in various other Bibles, this is in Psalm 14:1, as the numbering of the Psalms varies between different versions of the Bible]; although Carboni’s use of “stultus dicit” (*“stupid says”) differs from the Clementine Latin Vulgate and the Biblia Sacra Vulgatam, which use “dixit insipiens” (*“the fool [says]”), i.e. “Dixit insipiens in corde suo: Non est Deus” [Johann Friedrich Stapfer, in Institutiones Theologiæ Polemicæ Universae (third edition, 1757), uses the same wording as Carboni, “Psalm. XIV. I. dicens: Stultus dicit in Corde suo, non est Deus”]
*Veritas vero lente passu passu sicut puer, tandem aliquando janunculat ad lucem. = “The truth, however, as the young man slowly hand in hand hand in hand, and at last to the light janunculat at any time.”
*Tunc justus ut palma florescit. = “Then the just like the palm flourishes.”
References:
favete linguis:
Jon R. Stone. The Routledge Dictionary of Latin Quotations: The Illiterati’s Guide to Latin Maxims, Mottoes, Proverbs, and Sayings, Routledge, New York, 2005, page 295 (accessed 29 December 2012)
“Q. Horati Flacci Carminvm Liber Tertivs”, The Latin Library [“Fauete linguis”] (accessed 29 December 2012)
Stultus dicit in corde suo, “non est Deus.”:
Biblia Sacra Vulgatae Editionis, Nicolaum Pezzana [Nicolas Pezzana], Venetiis [Venice, Italy], 1669, page 395 (accessed 20 January 2013)
Joh. Frid. Stapferi. Institutiones Theologiæ Polemicæ Universæ, Ordine Scientifico Dispositæ (volume 2), Tiguri apud Heideggerum et Socios [*“Huts with Heidegger and allies”], 1757 (3rd edition), page 608 (20th line) (accessed 20 January 2013)
“Psalms 13:1 : Douay-Rheims Bible parallelChristian Community, New Jerusalem, Clementine Latin Vulgate, Biblia Sacra Vulgatam”, Veritas Bible (accessed 4 January 2013)
“Psalm 14”, New Advent [Psalm 14:1] (accessed 4 January 2013)
“Psalm 14:1”, Online Multilingual Bible (accessed 4 January 2013)
Leave a Reply