LABERIUS—PUBLIUS SYRUS.
The only fragment of any length or importance which we possess of Laberius, has been saved by Macrobius, in his Saturnalia. The fragments of Publius Syrus were chiefly preserved by Seneca and Au. Gellius, and the scattered maxims which they had recorded, were collected in various MSS. of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. They were first printed together, under the superintendence of Erasmus, in 1502, as revised and corrected from a MS. in the University of Cambridge. Fabricius published some additional maxims, which had not previously been printed, in 1550. Stephens edited them at the end of his Fragments from the Greek and Latin Comic Poets, 1564; and Bentley published them along with Terence and the Fables of Phædrus, at Cambridge, in 1726. An improved edition, which had been prepared by Gruter, was printed under the superintendence of Havercamp, from a MS. after his death. The most complete edition, however, which has yet appeared, is that published by Orellius, at Leipsic, 1822. It contains 879 maxims, arranged in alphabetical order, from which, at least as the editor asserts, all those which are spurious have been rejected, and several that are genuine added. A Greek version of the maxims, by Jos. Scaliger, is given by him on the opposite side of the page, and he has appended a long commentary, in which he has quoted all the maxims of preceding or subsequent authors, who have expressed sentiments similar to those of Publius Syrus.
The sentences were translated into English from the edition of Erasmus, under the following title: “Proverbs or Adagies, with newe Additions, gathered out of the Chiliades of Erasmus, by Richard Taverner. Hereunto be also added, Mimi Publiani. Imprinted at Lo’don, in Fletstrete, at the signe of the Whyte Harte. Cum privilegio ad imprimendum solum.” On the back of the title is “the Prologe of the author, apologizing for his slender capacitie;” and concluding, “yet my harte is not to be blamed.” It contains sixty-four leaves, the last blank. On the last printed page are the “Faultes escaped in printynge,” which are seven in number. Beneath is the colophon, “Imprinted at London by Richarde Bankes, at the Whyte Harte, 1539.” This book was frequently reprinted. James Elphinston, long known to the public by his unsuccessful attempt to introduce a new and uniform mode of spelling into the English language, translated, in 1794, “The Sentencious Poets—Publius dhe Syrrian—Laberius dhe Roman Knight, &c. arrainged and translated into correspondent Inglish Mezzure[627].”