Kitap 1
22
Now Julius Paulus, the most learned man within my recollection, used to say witll keenness and understanding that superesse and its Greek equivalent had more than one meaning: for he declared that the Greeks used perisso/n both ways, either of what was superfluous and unnecessary or of what was too abundant, overflowing and excessive; that in the same way our earlier writers also employed superesse sometimes of what was superfluous, idle and not wholly necessary, a sense which we have just cited from Varro, and sometimes, as in Cicero, of that which indeed surpassed other things in copiousness and plentifulness, yet was immoderate and too extensive, and gushed forth more abundantly than was sufficient. Therefore one who says superesse se with reference to a man whom he is defending tries to convey none of these meanings, but uses superesse in a sense that is unknown and not in use. And he will not be able to appeal even to the authority of Virgil, who in his Georgics wrote as follows: iii. 10. I will be first to bear, so but my life still last (supersit), Home to my native land . . . For in this place Virgil seems to have used that word somewhat irregularly in giving supersit the sense of be present for a longer or more extended period, but on the contrary his use of the word in the following line is more nearly the accepted one: iii. 126. They cut him tender grass, Give corn and much fresh water, that his strength Be more than equal to (superesse) the pleasing toil. for here superesse means to be more than equal to the task and not to be crushed by it.
