Evelyn Waugh, Decline and Fall (Boston: Back Bay Books 1999; 1928), p. 54.
For generations the British bourgeoisie have spoken of themselves as gentlemen, and by that they have meant, among other things, a self-respecting scorn of irregular perquisites. It is the quality that distinguishes the gentleman from both the artist and the aristocrat.
Omnibus nobis totidem ante nos sunt; nullius non origo ultra memoriam iacet. Platon ait neminem regem non ex servis esse oriundum, neminem servum non1 ex regibus. Omnia ista longa varietas miscuit et sursum deorsum 5fortuna versavit. Quis est generosus? ad virtutem bene a natura compositus. Hoc unum intuendum est: alioquin si ad vetera revocas, nemo non inde est ante quod nihil est. A primo mundi ortu usque in hoc tempus perduxit nos ex splendidis sordidisque alternata series. Non facit nobilem atrium plenum fumosis imaginibus; nemo in nostram gloriam vixit nec quod ante nos fuit nostrum est: animus facit nobilem, cui ex quacumque condicione supra fortunam licet surgere.Seneca, Epistulae, V.44.4-5. My translation.
We all have had the same number of ancestors; there is no one whose ancestry does not extend beyond recollection. Plato says that every king springs from slaves and there is not a slave who does not descend from kings. All sorts have widely mixed together and fortune has turned them upside down. Who is well-born? He who by his nature is suited to virtue. That is what should be considered: otherwise if you call back to antiquity, there is no one who does not reach a time before which there is no information. From the first beginning of the world up to the present, we have been brought out of origins that were alternatively splendid and sordid. An atrium full of smoke-stained statues does make a man noble; no one lived for our glory and that which existed before us is not ours: the soul makes one noble, for it is allowed to rise above fortune from any circumstance.
Bona mens omnibus patet, omnes ad hoc sumus nobiles. Nec reicit quemquam philosophia nec eligit; omnibus lucet. Patricius Socrates non fuit. Cleanthes aquam traxit et rigando horto locavit manus. Platonem non accepit nobilem philosophia, sed fecit.Seneca, Epistulae, V.44.2-3. My translation.
A noble mind is available to everyone; according to this principle, all of us may gain distinction. Philosophy neither rejects nor selects anyone; it shine for everyone. Socrates was not a patrician. Cleanthes was employed as a hired hand drawing water from a well and watering a garden. Philosophy did not receive Plato as a an aristocrat, but made him one.