Pliny: Natural History, Vol. I (Loeb)

PLINY: NATURAL HISTORY

PREFACE, 30-33

31 Plancus also put it neatly when he was told that Asinius Pollio was composing declamations against him—to be published by himself or his children after Plancus’s death, so that Plancus would be unable to reply—by saying: "Only phantoms fight with the dead!" This remark dealt those declamations such a heavy blow that in educated circles they are considered the most shameless works in existence.

32 Accordingly, being safeguarded even against these "fault-quarrelers" (Cato’s neat term for them—a compound word, for what else do these people do but quarrel, or seek a quarrel?), we will follow through with the remainder of our intended plan.

33 Because I had to consider your busy schedule in the public interest, I have appended to this letter a table of contents for each book, and I have taken great care to ensure you do not have to read them through entirely. You, by these means, will save others from needing to read them from start to finish as well; instead, each person can simply look for the specific point they want and know exactly where to find it. This method was used previously in our literature by Valerius Soranus in his books entitled The Lady Initiates original: "ἐποπτίδων"; perhaps a title for a work of scholarship denoting the inner secrets of learning into which it admitted the Muses..