Marsilio Ficino, Epistolae (Venice: Matteo Capcasa, 1495), IV, ff.

96r-v; Opera omnia

(Basle: Sebastian Henricpetri, 1576), p. 780.

Philosophia sapientiam gignit, sapientia parit felicitatem.

Marsilius Ficinus Bastiano Salvino amitino suo, S. D.

Vbi nos dives potensque Iuno non audit haud prius nobis culpandae sunt Parcae quam numen
illud experiamur, quod quia viget ubique, affatim adest omnibus qui eidem adesse volunt. Audit
hominem nondum vocantem, exaudit quemlibet rite precantem. Totum igitur auxilium,
Salvine, nostrum nobis est a Minerva petendum, quo possimus quandoque nos tollere humo,
“superasque evadere ad auras”. Nempe solum id numen ad aethereum mundi caput hominem
potest attollere, quod ipso summi Iovis est capite natum. Quoniam vero non exaudit
quemquam, nisi rite precantem, conemur, amice, pro viribus recte hinc auxilium petere. Quis
nam sapientiam recte adorat, nisi qui sapienter? Sapienter autem hanc solus adorat qui poscit a
sapientia sapientiam. Non possumus nisi per illam quicquam vel ab ipsa, vel ab alio petere
sapienter, non possumus quicquam ab illa sapienter petere, nisi illam.
Hoc nos docuit Socrates vir omnium Apollinis iudicio, sapientissimus, quippe qui ut Plato in
Phaedro recenset, in quotidianis precibus suis, solam a deo sapientiam exoptabat. Sciebat enim
vir ille sapientissimus [dicimus Ep. 1495] insipientibus quidem vel quae bona vulgo videntur,
esse mala, sapienti autem etiam quae mala dicuntur bona tandem evadere. Felix cui bene
succedunt omnia! Soli autem succedunt bene qui bene omnibus utitur, solus bene singulis
utitur, qui et sui ipsius et aliorum vires a sapientia didicit. Felices igitur soli sapientiae
sacerdotes, qui vel in ipsa humana (ut ita dicam) miseria sunt beati.
Caeteri vero usque adeo sunt infelices ut in ipsa etiam humana felicitate sint miseri. Hinc
quanta legitimae philosophiae dignitas et divinitas sit apparet. In hac enim maxime consistit
perfectum sapientiae sacerdotium. Verumtamen adeo indigne impieque vulgo tractatur, ut ii
qui soli vere sapiunt et a quibus caeteri id ipsum habent, ut aliquid sapiant, maxime omnium
desipere iudicentur. Praeterea male putentur sentire de deo apud illos qui a philosophis deum
colere didicerunt, quando philosophorum rationibus intellexerunt, deum esse quem colant. O
falsissimum vulgi iudicium! Tunc Democritum philosophum putaverunt insipientem, cum
maxime sapiens factus coepit mortalium insipientiam deridere, et ab Hippocrate medicorum
sapientissimo iudicatus est omnium prudentissimus. Tunc Socratem divinum quasi male de diis
sentientem condemnaverunt, quando ab ipso eorum deo, utpote qui rectius quam caeteri de deo
sentiret, sapientissimus est appellatus. Sed rideat insanum vulgus ut libet, rideat philosophos
ut insanos et impios, interim philosophi et flebilem vulgi risum una cum Heraclito lugeant, et
ridiculum fletum cum Democrito rideant.

Cf. Epistolae I, f. 16v (=Operam omnia, p. 617): “Stultitia et miseria hominum. Marsilius
Ficinus Petro Vannio, Cherubino Quarqualio, Dominico Galleto. Vidistis pictam in gymnasio
meo mundi sphaeram et hinc atque illinc Democritum et Heraclitum, alterum quidem ridentem,
alterum vero flentem. Quidnam ridet Democritus? Quod luget Heraclitus, videlicet animal
monstruosum insanum et miserabilem.”

1
Philosophy begets wisdom, and wisdom begets happiness. Marsilio Ficino to his cousin
Sebastiano Salvini.

We should not incriminate the Parques when the rich and powerful Juno fails to hear us, before
we have experienced the divinity which, on account of its all-pervading power, is present in
abundance to all those who wish to be present to it. This divinity hears the man before he
speaks, and heeds the one who duly prays it. So, Salvini, we must obtain all the help we need
from Minerva, to be able one day to remove ourselves from the earth and “go out to the airy
regions above” [Aeneid VI, 128]. Surely the only divinity to have the power to elevate man to
the ethereal summit of the world is the one that is born from the very head of sovereign Jupiter.
But since this divinity only heeds those who duly pray it, let us try, my friend, to ask as best as
we can the help we need from it. For who duly prays Wisdom, except the one who lives wisely?
But only the one who asks some wisdom from Wisdom adores it wisely. We cannot ask wisely
something to Wisdom or any other divinity except through Wisdom itself, we cannot ask wisely
something from Wisdom, except some wisdom.
This is what Socrates teaches us, and, according to Apollo, he was the wisest man of all
especially since, as Plato reports in the Phaedrus [278b-279c], in his everyday prayers he only
asked from God to be wise. For this wisest man knew that to those who lack wisdom even the
things that seem good to the common people are evil, but that to the wise man even the things
that are said to be evil eventually become good. Happy is the one for whom all things occur
felicitiously, but they occur felicitiously only for the one who uses them well, and one uses
well all things only if he has learnt from Wisdom what is in his power and what is in the power
of others. So are only happy the priests of wisdom who even in human misery, so to speak, are
in beatitude.
But all the rest of mankind are so unhappy that even in human happiness they are miserable.
Hence it appears how worthy and divine philosophy is when duly practised. And yet the
common people treat it with such disrespect and impiety, that they consider least wise the only
men that are truly wise and thanks to whom all the others obtain some wisdom. For this reason,
those who have learnt from the philosophers to honour God are considered to have formed a
bad opinion about God, on the grounds that it is by means of philosophical arguments that they
have grasped the existence of the God they honour. Most deceitful judgment of the common
people!
So they considered that the philosopher Democritus was insane when, having reached the
highest level of wisdom, he started to laugh at the mortals’ madness, and Hippocrates, who is
the wisest of the doctors, considered that he was the most prudent of all men [ps. Hippocrates,
Letter 17]. So they condemned the divine Socrates for his alleged impious thoughts about the
gods, even though their very own God called him the wisest because his thoughts about God
were truer than those of the rest of mankind. But let the insane people laugh as much as they
want, let them laugh about the philosophers as if they were insane and impious—meanwhile
let the philosophers weep alongside Heraclitus at the tearful laughter of the people, and laugh
at their laughable tears alongside Democritus!