Octavius 13.2

Minucius Felix · Octavius · ca. 197–250 · Rome · Read in context

Summary: Socrates was wisest because he knew he knew nothing.

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Latin text · CSEL 2:17

merito ergo de oraculo testimonium meruit prudentiae singularis. quod oraculum, idem ipse persensit, idcirco uniuersis se esse praepositum, non quod omnia comperisset, sed quod nihil se scire didicisset: ita confessae inperitiae summa prudentia est.

English · Claude translation

Rightly, therefore, he earned from the oracle the testimony of singular wisdom. He himself perceived that oracle's meaning: that he was set above all men not because he had discovered everything but because he had learned that he knew nothing. So the highest wisdom is the confession of ignorance.

About this passage

Source: CSEL 2:17 · Karl Halm, ed., M. Minucii Felicis Octavius; Iulii Firmici Materni Liber de errore profanarum religionum, CSEL 2 (Vienna: Gerold, 1867), 1–56 · Latin text: K. Halm (CSEL 2, 1867), digitized by Open Greek and Latin, University of Leipzig (csel-dev), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text: As printed in CSEL 2. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation: Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Latin text of CSEL 2; made independently of existing English translations.
Compare: Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 4 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made) · Divided there by chapter only.

Cite this passage

Minucius Felix, Oct. 13.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/minucius-octavius/13/2/).

Plain text

Minucius Felix, Oct. 13.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/minucius-octavius/13/2/).

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