Expert: Maria - 5/30/2011

Question
How would I translate the motto "by virtue of the passage of time" into Latin where the word 'virtue' connotes a characteristic or luckiness, rather than chastity/fortitude, etc? The motto essentially means that time prevails over human suffering/our human issues are insignificant, etc. Thanks!

Answer
Hello,

“by virtue of the passage of time" in the sense you say translates as “transeuntis temporis gratiā” as well as “labentis temporis gratiā”.
Read more below.
Best regards,
Maria
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Note that:

-by virtue = GRATIA ( ablative singular, 1st.declension. This ablative requests the genitive TEMPORIS)

-of the passage = TRANSEUNTIS (present participle of the verb TRANSEO in the genitive agreed with TEMPORIS ) or LABENTIS ( present participle of the verb LABOR in the genitive agreed with TEMPORIS). Latin uses the present participle TRANSEUNTIS/ LABENTIS ( “going by/ passing”  ) instead of the noun “passage”.
In fact, both “transeuntis temporis gratiā” and  “labentis temporis gratiā” literally mean "by virtue of going by/passing time”.

-of time= TEMPORIS (genitive of TEMPUS, 3rd.declension)

As you can see, Latin word order can be different from English.