Esse quam videri is a
Latin phrase meaning "To be, rather than to seem." It has been used as a
motto by a number of different groups.
History
Esse quam videri is found in
Cicero's essay On Friendship (Laelius de Amicitia, chapter 98). Virtute enim ipsa non tam multi praediti esse quam videri volunt ("Few are those who wish to be endowed with virtue rather than to seem so").
Just a few years after Cicero,
Sallust used the phrase in his Bellum Catilinae (54.6), writing that
Cato the Youngeresse quam videri bonus malebat ("He preferred to be good rather than to seem so").
Previous to both Romans,
Aeschylus used a similar phrase in Seven Against Thebes at
line 592, at which the scout (angelos) says of the seer/priest
Amphiaraus: οὐ γὰρ δοκεῖν ἄριστος, ἀλλ᾽ εἶναι θέλει (ou gàr dokeîn
áristos, all' eînai thélei: "he doesn't want to seem, but to be the bravest").
Plato quoted this line in Republic (361b).
Groton School (1884), Groton, Massachusetts, US. The motto changed to Cui Servire est Regnare ("To whom to serve is to reign") shortly after the school's founding.
Television personality
Stephen Colbert inverted the statement on his show The Colbert Report to Videri Quam Esse,[41] meaning "to seem to be rather than to be." It is also engraved across the faux hearth, above the video fireplace, in his studio, under his portrait.
^"Family". Wallenberg.com. Retrieved 24 December 2018.
The family's website claims the meaning
"to act, not to seem to be"
which is not a valid translation of "Esse, non videri"; Latin phrases that do have this meaning include "agere, non videri" and "facere, non videri".
Esse quam videri is a
Latin phrase meaning "To be, rather than to seem." It has been used as a
motto by a number of different groups.
History
Esse quam videri is found in
Cicero's essay On Friendship (Laelius de Amicitia, chapter 98). Virtute enim ipsa non tam multi praediti esse quam videri volunt ("Few are those who wish to be endowed with virtue rather than to seem so").
Just a few years after Cicero,
Sallust used the phrase in his Bellum Catilinae (54.6), writing that
Cato the Youngeresse quam videri bonus malebat ("He preferred to be good rather than to seem so").
Previous to both Romans,
Aeschylus used a similar phrase in Seven Against Thebes at
line 592, at which the scout (angelos) says of the seer/priest
Amphiaraus: οὐ γὰρ δοκεῖν ἄριστος, ἀλλ᾽ εἶναι θέλει (ou gàr dokeîn
áristos, all' eînai thélei: "he doesn't want to seem, but to be the bravest").
Plato quoted this line in Republic (361b).
Groton School (1884), Groton, Massachusetts, US. The motto changed to Cui Servire est Regnare ("To whom to serve is to reign") shortly after the school's founding.
Television personality
Stephen Colbert inverted the statement on his show The Colbert Report to Videri Quam Esse,[41] meaning "to seem to be rather than to be." It is also engraved across the faux hearth, above the video fireplace, in his studio, under his portrait.
^"Family". Wallenberg.com. Retrieved 24 December 2018.
The family's website claims the meaning
"to act, not to seem to be"
which is not a valid translation of "Esse, non videri"; Latin phrases that do have this meaning include "agere, non videri" and "facere, non videri".