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Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Catonic Thoughts

...ceterum censeo Creationem Consulto delendam esse.  
( "...furthermore, I believe that Intelligent Design must be destroyed." because it is disguised idolatry - or polytheism.)




I was originally going to title this "Catonic Love" - an absolutely horrible title. The reference is to good old Cato, the Roman Censor. And the creation of the adjective "catonic" was a play on "platonic".

However, catonic is too, too reminescent of catatonic, not to mention catamite. This source of confusion is immeasurably compounded by the fact that I never could keep clear the meanings of catamount and catamite. 
( You may think this odd, but I did spend one summer of my high school years swimming, sun-bathing, and reading Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. I believe Caligula was termed a catamite or had some such rent-boys about the palace.)

I can look at the word catonic and see cat-o'-nine-tails by reading too fast. It is a short trip then to cat on a hot tin roof and any number of misleading notions.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Gibbon´s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is great, but in mi opinion, Theodor Mommsen's History of Rome, probably is the best ever
written about this historical period.
Kind regards.