Note (79) — BOOK V. (continued 2)

79. Now this is a very bad kind.) One of the great sources of corruption is a false punctuation; and as I could make no sense of this sentence as it now stands, I have translated it agreeably to the following; Namque pessimum id genus est. Fereque primum id fit, quod cacoethes à Græcis nominatur. As it stood before, the cacoethes was called the worst kind, which our author contradicts immediately, by saying that no other species but that can be cured. Some of the older editions read ob quæ for namque, that is, ‘Upon these accounts this is a very bad kind.’ Which appears to agree better with the context.