si Phryx Aesopus potuit, si Anacharsis Scythes aeternam famam condere ingenio suo, ego litteratae qui sum proprior Graeciae, cur somno inerti deseram patriae decus, Threissa cum gens numeret auctores deos, Linoque Apollo sit parens, Musa Orpheo, qui saxa cantu movit et domuit feras Hebrique tenuit impetus dulci mora?
If Aesop the Phrygian, if Anacharsis the Scythian, could, by the exercise of their inborn talents, establish an everlasting fame, why should I, who am nearer by birth to the literary land of Greece, through sleepy indolence fail to uphold my countrys fame? Why indeed, considering that the Thracian race counts gods among its authors, that Apollo was the parent of Linus, and that a Muse was the mother of Orpheus'Orpheus who moved stones by the power of his song, who tamed wild beasts, and held in check the onrushing currents of the Hebrus, so pleased were they to linger and listen.
final_alignments\Phaedrus_Fables_Book3.json