90. discidiis: discidium, division, disagreement.
funditus: adv., completely.
91. si quando: if ever.
officium:dutiful action, service.
92. exstitit: exsistere, to stand forth, arise, appear.
adeundis: adire, here = to incur.
93. efferat: REL. CL. OF CHARACTERISTIC.
clamores: sc. some appropriate vb. such as facti (auditi, sublati) sunt.
tota cavea:in the entire theater (strictly the auditorium); the ABL. OF PLACE WHERE is regularly used without a prep. when the noun is modified by totus.
94. M. Pacuvii: Marcus Pacuvius, a tragic poet of the second cent. B.C. whose plays have not survived, despite his fame in antiquity; Laelius, as this passage indicates, was his patron.
fabula: the regular word for play as well as story. This play was apparently based on Euripides’ Iphigenia among the Taurians, in which the famous friends Orestes and Pylades are arrested by Thoas, king of the Taurians. Thoas has condemned Orestes to death but does not know which of the two strangers actually is Orestes, hence the setting for this display of loyalty between friends.
96. ita ut erat: i.e., as was the case.
97. perseveraret: perseverare, to persevere, persist, insist.
stantes: i.e., the audience at the play.
ficta: fingere,to invent, imagine, make up.
101. hactenus: adv., thus far.
102. si quae…sunt: if there are any (other) things.
praeterea: adv., beyond, besides.
eis: the professional philosophers alluded to in line 46.
si videbitur (103):if it seems best, if you please.
103. quaeritote: fut. imper., a formal equivalent of quaerite.
Transition to a new topic.
Hactenus mihi videor de amicitia quid sentirem potuisse dicere. Si quae praeterea sunt (credo autem esse multa), ab eis, si videbitur, qui ista disputant, quaeritote.
“Pylades and Orestes Brought as Victims before Iphigenia” Benjamin West, 1766 Tate Gallery, London, Great Britain
Tate Gallery, London/Art Resource, NY.
104. a te: sc. quaerimus.
quamquam: conj., although or, at the beginning of a sent. or a main cl., and yet.
105. aliud quoddam (106): lit., a certain other thing = something quite different.
106. filum: thread, hence metaphorically style; sc. est.
108. illud: subj. of solet and in appos. to the utrum…an cl., a double IND. QUEST.
considerandum: PRED. ADJ., deserving of consideration.
109. inopiam: inopia, need, want.
110. meritis: meritum, benefit, service.
quod…acciperet (111): = (ut) quisque ab alio acciperet id quod ipse per se (accipere) minus posset.
111. vicissim: adv., in turn.
an:or, introducing the second part of the IND. QUEST., which itself has two parts, (1) hoc esset proprium, (2) sed alia causa (esset) antiquior….
hoc: i.e., the desire of mutual advantage just mentioned.
113. profecta: here, derived.
