My Latin friends are starting to feed me with Latin poetry and wisdom, and it is stirring very old childhood memories in me, a Latin reawakening. My friend and German professor, Wolfgang Illauer, sent me a list of famous quotes, translated as literally as possible from Latin to German. In this series, I will introduce them one by one, first in Latin, then in Wolfgang’s German, and then in my English. Let’s hope we are able to preserve the beauty and elegance of the original phrases, all by Horace (23 BC) in his famous work Odes.
Carpe diem quam minime credula postero.
— Horace, Odes Book I, Poem 11, Line 8
In the English speaking world, in educated circles, we have all heard Carpe Diem, and we know it means Seize the Day.
Wolfgang in German: Pflücke (= genieße nach und nach) den (gegenwärtigen) Tag, möglichst gar nicht vertrauend dem kommenden Tag!
Norbert in English, literally: Pluck (= enjoy piece by piece) the (current) day, possibly not trusting in the following day!
Norbert in English, freeform: Seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future.
And here you have it. Now you know where Carpe Diem comes from!
I’ll follow your advice to carpe diem. 🙂
And the poem is even addressed to a woman. Hence “credula” instead of “credulus”