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diff --git a/35750-tei/35750-tei.tei b/35750-tei/35750-tei.tei new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5d916aa --- /dev/null +++ b/35750-tei/35750-tei.tei @@ -0,0 +1,21288 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> +<!DOCTYPE TEI.2 SYSTEM "http://www.gutenberg.org/tei/marcello/0.4/dtd/pgtei.dtd"> + +<TEI.2 lang="en"> + <teiHeader> + <fileDesc> + <titleStmt> + <title>History of Roman Literature from its Earliest Period to the Augustan Age. Volume I</title> + <author><name reg="Dunlop, John">John Dunlop</name></author> + </titleStmt> + <publicationStmt> + <publisher>Project Gutenberg TEI Edition 1</publisher> + <date value="2011-04-01">April 1, 2011</date> + <idno type="etext-no">35750</idno> + <availability> + <p>This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and + with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it + away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg + License online at www.gutenberg.org/license</p> + </availability> + </publicationStmt> + + <sourceDesc> + <bibl> + <author><name reg="Dunlop, John">John Dunlop</name></author> + <title>History of Roman Literature from its Earliest Period to the Augustan Age. Volume 1</title> + <imprint><pubPlace>Philadelphia</pubPlace> + <publisher>Littell</publisher> + <date>1827</date> + </imprint> + </bibl> + </sourceDesc> + </fileDesc> + <encodingDesc> + <editorialDecl><p>See transcriber’s note in the back.</p></editorialDecl> + </encodingDesc> + <profileDesc> + <langUsage> + <language id="el">Greek</language> + <language id="en">English</language> + </langUsage> + </profileDesc> + <revisionDesc> + <change> + <date value="2011-04-01">April 1, 2011</date> + <respStmt> + <resp> + Produced by <name>Ted Garvin</name>, <name>Stefan Cramme</name> + and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + </resp> + </respStmt> + <item>Project Gutenberg TEI edition 1</item> + </change> + </revisionDesc> + </teiHeader> + <pgExtensions> + <pgStyleSheet> + .italic { font-style: italic } + .bold { font-weight: bold } + lg { margin-left: 2 } + head { text-align: center } + list.nested { margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0 } + .Greek { font-family: Gentium, 'New Athena Unicode', 'DejaVu Serif', 'Lucida Grande', 'Arial Unicode MS', 'Palatino Linotype', serif} + </pgStyleSheet> + <!-- uncomment this CharMap to directly generate ISO 8859-1; replace "(two dashes)" in the first char with the mentioned characters --> + <!--<pgCharMap formats="txt"> + <char id="U0x2014"> + <charName>mdash</charName> + <desc>EM DASH</desc> + <mapping>(two dashes)</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x02d8"> + <charName>breve</charName> + <desc>BREVE</desc> + <mapping>[breve]</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x2009"> + <charName>thinsp</charName> + <desc>THIN SPACE</desc> + <mapping></mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x2003"> + <charName>emsp</charName> + <desc>EM SPACE</desc> + <mapping> </mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x2026"> + <charName>hellip</charName> + <desc>HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS</desc> + <mapping>...</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0101"> + <charName>a</charName> + <desc>LATIN SMALL LETTER A WITH MACRON</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0391"> + <charName>Alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ALPHA</desc> + <mapping>A</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0392"> + <charName>Beta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER BETA</desc> + <mapping>B</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0393"> + <charName>Gamma</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER GAMMA</desc> + <mapping>G</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0394"> + <charName>Delta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER DELTA</desc> + <mapping>D</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0395"> + <charName>Epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON</desc> + <mapping>E</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0396"> + <charName>Zeta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ZETA</desc> + <mapping>Z</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0397"> + <charName>Eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ETA</desc> + <mapping>Ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0398"> + <charName>Theta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER THETA</desc> + <mapping>Th</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x0399"> + <charName>Iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER IOTA</desc> + <mapping>I</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x039a"> + <charName>Kappa</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER KAPPA</desc> + <mapping>K</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x039b"> + <charName>Lambda</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER LAMBDA</desc> + <mapping>L</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x039c"> + <charName>Mu</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER MU</desc> + <mapping>M</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x039d"> + <charName>Nu</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER NU</desc> + <mapping>N</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x039e"> + <charName>Xi</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER XI</desc> + <mapping>X</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x039f"> + <charName>Omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMICRON</desc> + <mapping>O</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a0"> + <charName>Pi</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER PI</desc> + <mapping>P</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a1"> + <charName>Rho</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER RHO</desc> + <mapping>R</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a3"> + <charName>Sigma</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER SIGMA</desc> + <mapping>S</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a4"> + <charName>Tau</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER TAU</desc> + <mapping>T</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a5"> + <charName>Upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER UPSILON</desc> + <mapping>Y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a6"> + <charName>Phi</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER PHI</desc> + <mapping>Ph</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a7"> + <charName>Chi</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER CHI</desc> + <mapping>CH</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a8"> + <charName>Psi</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER PSI</desc> + <mapping>PS</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03a9"> + <charName>Omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMEGA</desc> + <mapping>Ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b1"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b2"> + <charName>beta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER BETA</desc> + <mapping>b</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b3"> + <charName>gamma</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA</desc> + <mapping>g</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b4"> + <charName>delta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER DELTA</desc> + <mapping>d</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b5"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON</desc> + <mapping>e</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b6"> + <charName>zeta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ZETA</desc> + <mapping>z</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b7"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b8"> + <charName>theta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA</desc> + <mapping>th</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03b9"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA</desc> + <mapping>i</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03ba"> + <charName>kappa</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER KAPPA</desc> + <mapping>k</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03bb"> + <charName>lambda</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER LAMBDA</desc> + <mapping>l</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03bc"> + <charName>mu</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER MU</desc> + <mapping>m</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03bd"> + <charName>nu</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER NU</desc> + <mapping>n</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03be"> + <charName>xi</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER XI</desc> + <mapping>x</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03bf"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON</desc> + <mapping>o</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c0"> + <charName>pi</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER PI</desc> + <mapping>p</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c1"> + <charName>rho</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO</desc> + <mapping>r</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c2"> + <charName>sigmaf</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA</desc> + <mapping>s</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c3"> + <charName>sigma</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA</desc> + <mapping>s</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c4"> + <charName>tau</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU</desc> + <mapping>t</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c5"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c6"> + <charName>phi</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER PHI</desc> + <mapping>ph</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c7"> + <charName>chi</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI</desc> + <mapping>ch</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c8"> + <charName>psi</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER PSI</desc> + <mapping>ps</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03c9"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA</desc> + <mapping>ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03cb"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH DIALYTIKA</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03d7"> + <charName>Kappa</charName> + <desc>GREEK KAI SYMBOL</desc> + <mapping>kai</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03d9"> + <charName>Kappa</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ARCHAIC KOPPA</desc> + <mapping>k</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x03dd"> + <charName>gamma</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER DIGAMMA</desc> + <mapping>f</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f00"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f01"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>ha</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f02"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f04"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f05"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>ha</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f06"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f08"> + <charName>Alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>A</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f09"> + <charName>Alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ALPHA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>Ha</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f0c"> + <charName>Alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ALPHA WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>A</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f0d"> + <charName>Alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ALPHA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>Ha</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f10"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>e</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f11"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>he</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f13"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH DASIA AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>he</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f14"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>e</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f15"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>he</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f18"> + <charName>Epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>E</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f19"> + <charName>Epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>He</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f1b"> + <charName>Epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON WITH DASIA AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>He</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f1c"> + <charName>Epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER EPSILON WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>E</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f20"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f21"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>hê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f22"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH PSILI AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f23"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH DASIA AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>hê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f24"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f25"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>hê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f26"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH PSILI AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f27"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH DASIA AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>hê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f28"> + <charName>Eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ETA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>Ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f29"> + <charName>Eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ETA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>Hê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f2e"> + <charName>Eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ETA WITH PSILI AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>Ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f30"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>i</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f31"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>hi</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f33"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH DASIA AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>hi</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f34"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>i</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f35"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>hi</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f36"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH PSILI AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>i</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f37"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH DASIA AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>hi</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f38"> + <charName>Iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER IOTA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>I</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f39"> + <charName>Iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER IOTA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>Hi</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f3d"> + <charName>Iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER IOTA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>Hi</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f40"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>o</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f41"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>ho</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f43"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH DASIA AND VARIA</desc> + <mapping>ho</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f44"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>o</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f45"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>ho</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f48"> + <charName>Omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMICRON WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>O</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f49"> + <charName>Omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMICRON WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>Ho</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f4c"> + <charName>Omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMICRON WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>O</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f4d"> + <charName>Omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMICRON WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>Ho</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f50"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f51"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>hy</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f54"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f55"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>hy</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f56"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH PSILI AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f57"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH DASIA AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>hy</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f59"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER UPSILON WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>Hy</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f5d"> + <charName>Upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER UPSILON WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>Hy</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f60"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f61"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>hô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f64"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f65"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>hô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f66"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH PSILI AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f67"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH DASIA AND PERISPOMENI</desc> + <mapping>hô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f68"> + <charName>Omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMEGA WITH PSILI</desc> + <mapping>Ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f69"> + <charName>Omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMEGA WITH DASIA</desc> + <mapping>Hô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f6c"> + <charName>Omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMEGA WITH PSILI AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>Ô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f6d"> + <charName>Omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK CAPITAL LETTER OMEGA WITH DASIA AND OXIA</desc> + <mapping>Hô</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f70"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH VARIA</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f71"> + <charName>alpha</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH OXIA</desc> + <mapping>a</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f72"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH VARIA</desc> + <mapping>e</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f73"> + <charName>epsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH OXIA</desc> + <mapping>e</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f74"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH VARIA</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f75"> + <charName>eta</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA WITH OXIA</desc> + <mapping>ê</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f76"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH VARIA</desc> + <mapping>i</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f77"> + <charName>iota</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA WITH OXIA</desc> + <mapping>i</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f78"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA</desc> + <mapping>o</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f79"> + <charName>omicron</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH OXIA</desc> + <mapping>o</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f7a"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH VARIA</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f7b"> + <charName>upsilon</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH OXIA</desc> + <mapping>y</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x1f7c"> + <charName>omega</charName> + <desc>GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH VARIA</desc> 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SINGLE QUOTATION MARK</desc> + <mapping>'</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x201C"> + <charName>ldquo</charName> + <desc>LEFT DOUBLE QUOTATION MARK</desc> + <mapping>"</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x201D"> + <charName>rdquo</charName> + <desc>RIGHT DOUBLE QUOTATION MARK</desc> + <mapping>"</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x152"> + <charName>OElig</charName> + <desc>LATIN CAPITAL LIGATURE OE</desc> + <mapping>OE</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x153"> + <charName>oelig</charName> + <desc>LATIN SMALL LIGATURE OE</desc> + <mapping>oe</mapping> + </char> + <char id="U0x2013"> + <charName>ndash</charName> + <desc>EN DASH</desc> + <mapping>-</mapping> + </char> + </pgCharMap>--> + </pgExtensions> + +<text lang="en"> +<front> + <div> + <divGen type="pgheader" /> + </div> + <div> + <divGen type="encodingDesc" /> + </div> +<titlePage rend="text-align: center; page-break-before: right"> + <pb/><anchor id="Pgi"/> + +<docTitle> +<titlePart type="main"><hi rend="font-size: xx-large; font-weight: bold">HISTORY</hi><lb/><lb/> +OF<lb/><lb/> +<hi rend="font-size: xx-large; font-weight: bold">ROMAN LITERATURE,</hi></titlePart> + <lb/><lb/> +<titlePart type="sub">FROM<lb/><lb/> +<hi rend="font-size: x-large; font-weight: bold">ITS EARLIEST PERIOD</hi><lb/> +TO<lb/><lb/> +<hi rend="font-size: large">THE AUGUSTAN AGE.</hi><lb/><lb/><lb/> +IN TWO VOLUMES.</titlePart> + +</docTitle> + <lb/><lb/> +<byline>BY<lb/> + <docAuthor><hi rend="font-size: large">John Dunlop</hi></docAuthor>,<lb/> + AUTHOR OF THE HISTORY OF FICTION.</byline> + <lb/> + <docEdition>FROM THE LAST LONDON EDITION.</docEdition> + <lb/><lb/> + <docTitle> + <titlePart> + <hi rend="font-size: large">VOL. I.</hi> + </titlePart> + </docTitle> + <lb/><lb/> + <docImprint>PUBLISHED BY<lb/> +E. LITTELL, CHESTNUT STREET, PHILADELPHIA.<lb/> +G. & C. CARVILL, BROADWAY, NEW YORK.</docImprint> + <lb/> + <docDate><hi rend="font-size: large">1827</hi></docDate> +</titlePage> + <pb/><anchor id="Pgii"/> + + <div type="ack" rend="page-break-before: always"> + <p rend="text-align: center"> +<hi rend="italic">James Kay, Jun. Printer,<lb/>S. E. Corner of Race & Sixth Streets,<lb/>Philadelphia.</hi> + + </p> + </div> + <div type="contents" rend="page-break-before: right"> + <head>Contents.</head> + <divGen type="toc"/> + </div> + + <div type="preface" rend="page-break-before: right"> +<pb n="iii"/><anchor id="Pgiii"/> + <index index="toc" level1="Preface"/><index index="pdf" level1="Preface"/> +<head>PREFACE.</head> + +<p> +There are few subjects on which a greater number of +laborious volumes have been compiled, than the History and +Antiquities of <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Rome</hi>. Everything connected with its foreign +policy and civil constitution, or even with the domestic manners +of its citizens, has been profoundly and accurately investigated. +The mysterious origin of Rome, veiled in the wonders +of mythological fable—the stupendous increase of its power, +rendered yet more gigantic by the mists of antiquity—its undaunted +heroes, who seem to us like the genii of some greater +world—its wide dominion, extended over the whole civilized +globe—and, finally, its portentous fall, which forms, as it were, +the separation between ancient and modern times, have rendered +its civil and military history a subject of prevailing interest +to all enlightened nations. But, while its warlike exploits, +and the principles of its political institutions, have been repeatedly +and laboriously investigated, less attention, perhaps, +<pb n="iv"/><anchor id="Pgiv"/>has been paid to the history of its literature, than to that of any +other country, possessed of equal pretensions to learning and +refinement; and, in the English language at least, no connected +view of its Rise, its Progress, and Decline, has been as +yet presented to us. When the battles of Rome have been +accurately described, and all her political intrigues minutely +developed—when so much inquiry and thought have been bestowed, +not only on the wars, conquests, and civil institutions +of the Romans, but on their most trivial customs, it is wonderful +that so little has been done to exhibit the intellectual exertions +of the fancy and the reason, of their most refined and +exalted spirits. +</p> + +<p> +It cannot, indeed, be denied, that the civil history of Rome, +and her military operations, present our species in a lofty aspect +of power, magnanimity, and courage—that they exhibit +the widest range and utmost extent of the human powers in +enterprize and resources—and that statesmen or philosophers +may derive from them topics to illustrate almost every political +speculation. Yet, however vast and instructive may be the +page which unfolds the eventful history of the foreign hostilities +and internal commotions of the Roman people, it can hardly +be more interesting than the analogies between their literary +attainments and the other circumstances of their condition;—the +peculiarities of their literature, its peculiar origination, and +the peculiar effects which it produced. The literature of a +people may indeed, in one sense, be regarded as the most attractive +feature of its history. It is at once the effect of +leisure and refinement, and the means of increasing and perpetuating +the civilization from which it springs. Literature, as a +late writer has powerfully and eloquently demonstrated, pos<pb n="v"/><anchor id="Pgv"/>sesses +an extensive moral agency, and a close connection with + glory, liberty, and happiness<note place="foot">Mad. de Staël, <hi rend="italic">De la Litterature</hi>, Tom. I.</note>; and hence the <hi rend="italic">history</hi> of literature +becomes associated with all that concerns the fame, the +freedom, and the felicity of nations. <q>There is no part of history,</q> +says Dr Johnson, <q>so generally useful, as that which +relates the progress of the human mind—the gradual improvement +of reason—the successive advances of science—the vicissitudes +of learning and ignorance, which are the light and darkness +of thinking beings—the extinction and resuscitation of +arts, and the revolutions of the intellectual world. If accounts +of battles and invasions are peculiarly the business of princes, + the useful or elegant arts are not to be neglected<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Rasselas</hi>.</note>.</q> If, then, +in the literary history of Rome, we do not meet with those dazzling +events, and stupendous results, which, from their lustre +and magnitude, still seem, as it were, placed at the summit of +human affairs, we shall find in it more intelligence and order, +in consequence of its progress being less dependent on passion +and interest. The trophies, too, of the most absolute power, +and the most unlimited empire, seem destined, as if by a moral +necessity, to pass away: But the dominion which the writers of +Rome exercise over the human mind, will last as long as the +world, or at least as long as its civilization— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Alas, for Tully’s voice, and Virgil’s lay,</q></l> +<l>And Livy’s pictured page!—But these shall be</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Her resurrection; all beside—decay<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Childe Harolde</hi>, c. IV.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There are chiefly two points of view, in which literary history +may be regarded as of high utility and importance. The +<pb n="vi"/><anchor id="Pgvi"/><hi rend="italic">first</hi> is the consideration of the powerful effect of literature on +the manners and habits of the people among whom it flourishes. +It is noble, indeed, in itself, and its productions are glorious, +without any relative considerations. An ingenious literary +performance has <anchor id="corrvi"/><corr sic="it">its</corr> intrinsic merits, and would delight an enthusiastic +scholar, or contemplative philosopher, in perfect +solitude, even though he himself were the only reader, and the +work the production of a Being of a different order from himself. +But what renders literature chiefly interesting, is the +influence which it exercises on the dignity and happiness of +human nature, by improving the character, and enlarging the +capacity, of our species. A stream, however grand or beautiful +in itself, derives its chief interest from a consideration of its +influence on the landscape it adorns; and, in this point of view, +literature has been well likened to <q>a noble lake or majestic +river, which imposes on the imagination by every impression +of dignity and sublimity. But it is the moisture that insensibly +arises from them, which, gradually mingling with the soil, +nourishes all the luxuriance of vegetation, and fructifies and + adorns the surface of the earth<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Vindiciæ Gallicæ</hi>.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Literature, however, has not in all ages denoted, with equal +accuracy, the condition of mankind, or been equally efficacious +in impelling their progress, and contributing to their improvement. +In the ancient empires of the East, where monarchies +were despotic, and priests the only scholars, learning was regarded +by those who were possessed of it rather as a means of +confirming an ascendancy over the vulgar, than of improving +their condition; and they were more desirous to perpetuate the +subjection, than contribute to the melioration of mankind. Ac<pb n="vii"/><anchor id="Pgvii"/>cordingly, +almost every trace of this confined and perverted +learning has vanished from the world. In the freer states of +antiquity, as the republics of Greece and Rome, letters found +various outlets, by which their improving influence was imparted, +more or less extensively, to the bulk of the citizens. +Dramatic representations were among the most favourite +amusements, and oratorical displays excited among all classes +the most lively interest. Such public exhibitions established +points of contact, from which light was elicited. The mind +of the multitude was enriched by the contemplation of superior +intellect, and mankind were, to a certain extent, united by the +reception of similar impressions, and the excitement of similar +emotions. +</p> + +<p> +Still, however, the history of any part of ancient literature +is, in respect of its influence on the condition of states, far less +important than that of modern nations. From the high price +and scarcity of books, a restriction was imposed on the diffusion +of knowledge. <q>A bulwark existed between the body of +mankind and the reflecting few. They were distinct nations +inhabiting the same country; and the opinions of the one, +speaking comparatively with modern times, had little influence + on the other<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Vindiciæ Gallicæ</hi>.</note>.</q> The learned, in those days, wrote only or +chiefly for the learned and the great. They neither expected +nor cultivated the approbation of the mass of mankind. An extensive +and noisy celebrity was interdicted. It was only with the +more estimable part of his species that the author was united +by that sympathy which we term the Love of Fame. He was +the head, not of a numerous, but of a select community. By +<pb n="viii"/><anchor id="Pgviii"/>nothing short of the highest excellence could he hope for the +approbation of judges so skilful, or expect an immortality so +difficult to be preserved. While this may, perhaps, have contributed +to the polish and perfection of literary works, it is +obvious that the general influence of letters must have been +less humanizing, and must have had less tendency to unite and +assimilate mankind. Even philosophers, whose peculiar business +was the instruction of their species, had no mode of disseminating +or perpetuating their opinions, except by the formation +of sects and schools, which created for the masters, +pupils who were the followers of his creed, and the depositaries +of his claims to immortality. +</p> + +<p> +It is the invention of the art of printing which has at length +secured the widest diffusion, and an unlimited endurance, to +learning and civilization. As a stone thrown into the sea agitates +(it has been said) more or less every drop in the expanse +of ocean, so every thought that is now cast into the fluctuating +but ceaseless tide of letters, will more or less affect the human +mind, and influence the human condition, throughout all the +habitable globe, and <q>to the last syllable of time.</q> +</p> + +<p> +It is this, and not the height to which individual genius has +soared, that forms the grand distinction between ancient and +modern literature. The triumph of modern literature consists +not in the point of elevation to which it has attained, but in the +extent of its conquests—the extent to which it has refined and +quickened the mass of mankind. It would be difficult to adjust +the intellectual precedence of Newton and Archimedes—of +Bacon and Aristotle—of Shakspeare and Homer—of Thucydides +and Hume: But it may be declared with certainty, that +the people of modern nations, in consequence of literature be<pb n="ix"/><anchor id="Pgix"/>ing more widely diffused, have become more civilized and enlightened. +The Indus and Oronoko, rolling amid woods and +deserts their waste of waters, may seem superior to the Thames +in the view of the mere admirer of the grandeur and magnificence +of nature; but how inferior are they in the eye of the +philosopher and historian! +</p> + +<p> +With regard to the Romans, in particular, they are allowed +to have been a civilized nation, powerfully constituted, and +wisely governed, previous to the existence of any author in the +Latin language. Their character was formed before their literature +was created: their moral and patriotic dignity, indeed, +had reached its highest perfection, in the age in which their +literature commenced—the age of Lælius and Africanus. Except +in the province of the drama, it always continued a patrician +attribute; and though intellectual improvement could not +have facilitated the inroads of vice and guilty ambition, it certainly +proved inadequate to stem the tide of moral corruption, +to mitigate the sanguinary animosities of faction, or to retard +the establishment of despotism. +</p> + +<p> +Literary history is, <hi rend="italic">secondly</hi>, of importance, as being the index +of the character and condition of a people—as holding up +a mirror, which reflects the manners and customs of remote or +ancient nations. The less influence, however, which literature +exercises, the less valuable will be its picture of life and manners. +It must also be admitted, that from a separate cause, the early +periods, at least, of Roman literature, possess not in this point +of view any peculiar attractions. When literature is indigenous, +as it was in Greece, where authors were guided by no antecedent +system, and their compositions were shaped on no +<pb n="x"/><anchor id="Pgx"/>other model than the objects themselves which they were occupied +in delineating, or the living passions they portrayed, an +accurate estimate of the general state of manners and feeling +may be drawn from works written at various epochs of the national +history. But, at Rome, the pursuit of literature was +neither a native nor predominant taste among the people. The +Roman territory was always a foreign soil for letters, which +were not the produce of national genius, but were naturalized +by the assiduous culture of a few individuals reared in the +schools of Greece. Indeed, the early Roman authors, particularly +the dramatic, who, of all others, best illustrate the prevalent +ideas and sentiments of a nation, were mere translators +from the Greek. Hence, those delineations, which at first +view might appear to be characteristic national sketches, are +in fact the draught of foreign manners, and the mirror of customs +which no Roman adopted, or of sentiments in which, perhaps, +no Roman participated. +</p> + +<p> +Since, then, the literature of Rome exercised but a limited +influence on the conduct of its citizens, and as it reciprocally +reflects but a partial light on their manners and institutions, its +history must, in a great measure, consist of biographical +sketches of <hi rend="italic">authors</hi>—of critical accounts of their <hi rend="italic">works</hi>—and +an examination of the <hi rend="italic">influence</hi> which these works have exercised +on modern literature. The <hi rend="italic">authors</hi> of Rome were, in +their characters, and the events of their lives, more interesting +than the writers of any ancient or modern land. The authors +who flourished during the existence of the Roman Republic, +were Cato the Censor, Cicero, and Cæsar; men who (independently +of their literary claims to celebrity) were unrivalled in +their own age and country, and have scarcely been surpassed +<pb n="xi"/><anchor id="Pgxi"/>in any other. I need not here anticipate those observations +which the <hi rend="italic">works</hi> of the Roman authors will suggest in the following +pages. Though formed on a model which has been +shaped by the Greeks, we shall perceive through that spirit of +imitation which marks all their literary productions, a tone of +practical utility, derived from the familiar acquaintance which +their writers exercised with the business and affairs of life; and +also that air of nationality, which was acquired from the greatness +and unity of the Roman republic, and could not be expected +in literary works, produced where there was a subdivision +of states in the same country, as in Greece, modern Italy, +Germany, and Britain. We shall remark a characteristic +authority of expression, a gravity, circumspection, solidity of +understanding, and dignity of sentiment, produced partly by +the moral firmness that distinguished the character of the Romans, +their austerity of manners, and tranquillity of temper, but +chiefly by their national pride, and the exalted name of Roman +citizen, which their authors bore. And, finally, we shall recognise +that love of rural retirement which originated in the +mode of life of the ancient Italians, and was augmented by the +pleasing contrast which the undisturbed repose and simple enjoyments +of rural existence presented to the bustle of an immense +and agitated capital. In the last point of view that has +been alluded to—the <hi rend="italic">influence</hi> which these works have exercised +on modern letters—it cannot be denied that the literary +history of Rome is peculiarly interesting. If the Greeks gave +the first impulse to literature, the Romans engraved the traces of +its progress deeper on the world. <q>The earliest writers,</q> as has +been justly remarked, <q>took possession of the most striking objects +for description, and the most probable occurrences for +<pb n="xii"/><anchor id="Pgxii"/>fiction, and left nothing to those that followed, but transcriptions +of the same events, and new combinations of the same + images<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Rasselas</hi>.</note>.</q> The great author from whom these reflections are +quoted, had at one time actually <q>projected a work, to show +how small a quantity of invention there is in the world, and that +the same images and incidents, with little variation, have served + all the authors who have ever written<note place="foot">Boswell’s <hi rend="italic">Life of Johnson</hi>, Vol. IV.</note>.</q> Had he prosecuted +his intention, he would have found the notion he entertained +fully confirmed by the history both of dramatic and +romantic fiction; he would have perceived the incapacity of +the most active and fertile imagination greatly to diversify the +common characters and incidents of life, which, on a superficial +view, one might suppose to be susceptible of infinite combinations; +he would have found, that while Plautus and Terence +servilely copied from the Greek dramatists, even Ariosto +scarcely diverged in his comedies from the paths of Plautus. +</p> + + <milestone unit="tb" rend="stars: 7"/> + +<p> +But whatever may be the advantages or imperfections of +a literary subject in its own nature, it is evident that it can +never be treated with effect or utility, unless sufficient materials +exist for compilation. Unfortunately, there was no historian +of Roman literature among the Romans themselves. Many +particulars, however, with regard to it, as also judgments on +productions which are now lost, may be collected from the +writings of Cicero; and many curious remarks, as well as amusing +anecdotes, may be gathered from the works of the latter +Classics; as Pliny’s <hi rend="italic">Natural History</hi>, the <hi rend="italic">Institutes</hi> of Quintilian, +the <hi rend="italic">Attic Nights</hi> of Aulus Gellius, and the <hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi> of +Macrobius. +</p> + +<pb n="xiii"/><anchor id="Pgxiii"/> + +<p> +Among modern authors who have written on the subject of +Roman literature, the first place is unquestionably due to Tiraboschi, +who, though a cold and uninteresting critic, is distinguished +by soundness of judgment and labour of research. +The first and second volumes of his great work, <hi rend="italic">Della Letteratura +Italiana</hi>, are occupied with the subject of Roman literature; +and though not executed with the same ability as the portion +of his literary history relating to modern Italy, they may +safely be relied on for correctness of facts and references. +</p> + +<p> +The recent French work of Schoell, entitled, <hi rend="italic">Histoire <anchor id="corrxiii"/><corr sic="Abregee">Abregée</corr> +de la Litterature Romaine</hi>, is extremely succinct and unsatisfactory +on the early periods of Roman literature. Though +consisting of four volumes, the author, at the middle of the first +volume of the book, has advanced as far as Virgil. It is more +complete in the succeeding periods, and, like his <hi rend="italic">Histoire de +la Litterature Grecque</hi>, is rather a history of the decline, than of +the progress and perfection of literature. +</p> + +<p> +A number of German works, (chiefly, however, bibliographical,) +have lately appeared on the subject of Roman literature. +I regret, that from possessing but a recent and limited acquaintance +with the language, I have not been able to draw so +extensively as might have been wished from these sources of +information. +</p> +<milestone unit="tb" rend="stars: 7"/> + +<p> +The composition of the present volumes was not suggested +by any of the works which I have mentioned on the subject of +Roman literature; but by the perusal of an elegant, though +somewhat superficial production, on <q>The Civil and Constitutional +History of Rome, from its Foundation to the Age of +<pb n="xiv"/><anchor id="Pgxiv"/>Augustus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Civil and Constitutional History of Rome, from its Foundation to the Age + of Augustus</hi>, by Henry Bankes, Esq. M. P. ed. London, 1818, 2 vol. 8vo.</note>.</q> It occurred to me that a History of Roman <hi rend="italic">Literature</hi>, +during the same period, might prove not uninteresting. +There are three great ages in the literary history of Rome—that +which precedes the æra of Augustus—the epoch which is +stamped with the name of that emperor—and the interval which +commenced immediately after his death, and may be considered +as extending to the destruction of Rome. Of these periods, +the first and second run into each other with respect to dates, +but the difference in their spirit and taste may be easily distinguished. +Although Cicero died during the triumvirate of Octavius, +his genius breathes only the spirit of the Republic; and +though Virgil and Horace were born during the subsistence of +the commonwealth, their writings bear the character of monarchical +influence. +</p> + +<p> +The ensuing volumes include only the first of these successive +periods. Whether I shall hereafter proceed to investigate +the history of the others, will depend on the reception which +the present effort may obtain, and on other circumstances +which I am equally unable to anticipate. +</p> + + <milestone unit="tb" rend="stars: 7"/> + +<p> +<hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Meanwhile</hi>, I have made considerable alterations, and, I +trust, improvements, in the present edition. These, however, +are so much interwoven with the body of the work, that they +cannot be specified—except some additional Translations from +<pb n="xv"/><anchor id="Pgxv"/>the Fragments of the older Latin poets—a Dissertation on the +<hi rend="italic">Tachygraphy</hi>, or short-hand writing of the Romans, introduced +at the commencement of the Appendix—and a Critical Account +of Cicero’s Dialogue <hi rend="italic">De Republica</hi>, which, though discovered, +had not issued from the press when the former edition was published. +</p> + </div> +<pb/><anchor id="Pg016"/> +</front> +<body rend="page-break-before: right"> + +<pb/><anchor id="Pg017"/> + +<head> +<hi rend="bold">HISTORY</hi> +</head> + +<head> +OF +</head> + +<head> +<hi rend="bold">ROMAN LITERATURE, &c.</hi> +</head> + +<pb/><anchor id="Pg018"/> + +<epigraph rend="page-break-before: always"> +<p><q>Parva quoque, ut ferme principia omnia, et ea ipsa peregrina res +fuit.</q><lb/> + <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Livy</hi>, lib. vii. c. 2. +</p> +</epigraph> + +<div rend="page-break-before: right"> +<pb n="19"/><anchor id="Pg019"/> + +<head> +<hi rend="bold">HISTORY</hi> +</head> + +<head> +OF +</head> + +<head> +<hi rend="bold">ROMAN LITERATURE, &c.</hi> +</head> + +<p> +In tracing the Literary History of a people, it is important +not only to ascertain whence their first rudiments of knowledge +were derived, but even to fix the origin of those tribes, +whose cultivation, being superior to their own, acted as an +incentive to literary exertion. The privilege, however, assumed +by national vanity, <hi rend="italic">miscendi humana divinis</hi>, has +enveloped the antiquities of almost every country in darkness +and mystery: But there is no race whose early history is +involved in greater obscurity and contradiction than the first +inhabitants of those Italian states, which finally formed component +parts of the Roman republic. The origin of the five +Saturnian, and twelve Etruscan cities, is lost in the mist of +ages; and we may as well hope to obtain credible information +concerning the monuments of Egypt or India, as to investigate +their inscrutable antiquities. At the period when light +is first thrown, by authentic documents, on the condition of +Italy, we find it occupied by various tribes, which had reached +different degrees of civilization, which spoke different dialects, +and disputed with each other the property of the lands whence +they drew their subsistence. All before that time is founded +on poetical embellishment, the speculations of theorists, or +national vanity arrogating to itself a Trojan, a Grecian, or +even a divine original. +</p> + +<p> +The happy situation of Italy, imbosomed in a sea, which +washed not only the coast of all the south of Europe, but +likewise the shores of Africa and Asia, afforded facilities for +<pb n="20"/><anchor id="Pg020"/>communication and commerce with almost every part of the +ancient world. It is probable, that a country gifted like this +peninsula, with a fertile soil, incomparable climate, and unusual +charms of scenery, attracted the attention of its neighbours, +and sometimes allured them from less favoured settlements. +<q>Il semble,</q> says a recent French writer, <q>que les Dieux aient +lancé l’Italie au milieu du vaste océan comme un Phare immense + qui appelle les navigateurs des pays les plus eloignés</q><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Voyage de Polyclete</hi>, Lettre 2. 3 Tom. Paris, 1820.</note>. +The customs, and even names, which were prevalent in Egypt, +Phœnicia, and Greece, were thus introduced into Italy, and +formed materials from which the framers of systems have constructed +theories concerning its first colonization by the Egyptians, +the Pelasgi, or whatever nation they chose. There is +scarcely, however, an ancient history or document entitled to +credit, and recording the arrival of a colony in Italy, which +does not also mention that the new-comers found prior tribes, +with whom they waged war, or intermixed. +</p> + +<p> +The ample lakes and lofty mountains, by which Italy is +intersected, naturally divided its inhabitants into separate and +independent nations. Of these by far the most celebrated +were the Etruscans. The origin of this remarkable people, +called Tyrrhenians by the Greeks, and Thusci, or Etrusci, by +the Latins, has been a subject of endless controversy among +antiquarians; and, indeed, had perplexed the ancients no less +than it has puzzled the moderns. Herodotus, the earliest authentic +historian whose works are now extant, represents them +as a colony of Lydians, who were themselves a tribe of the +vagrant Pelasgi. In the reign of Atys, son of Menes, the Lydian +nation being driven to extremity by famine, the king +divided it into two portions, one of which was destined to +remain in Asia, and the other to emigrate under the conduct +of his son Tyrrhenus. The inhabitants who composed the +latter division leaving their country, repaired to Smyrna, where +they built vessels, and removed in search of new abodes. After +touching on various shores, they penetrated into the heart of +Italy, and at length settled in Umbria. There they constructed +dwellings, and called themselves Tyrrhenians, from the + name of their leader<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Herod. Clio.</hi> c. 94.</note>. Some of the circumstances which Herodotus +relates as having occurred previous to the emigration +of the Lydian colony appear fabulous, as the invention of +games, in order to appease the sensation of hunger, and the +fasting every alternate day for a space of eighteen years; +and it would, perhaps, be too much to assert, that before +the Lydians, no other tribe had ever set foot in Umbria or +<pb n="21"/><anchor id="Pg021"/>Etruria. But the account of the departure of the colony +is itself plausible, and its truth appears to be corroborated, if +not confirmed, by certain resemblances in the language, religion, + and pastimes of the Lydians, and of the ancient Etruscans<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Herculanensia</hi>, Dissert. V. Lond. 1810.</note>. +The manners, too, and customs of the Lydians, did +not differ essentially from those of the Greeks; and the princes +of Lydia, like the sovereigns of Persia, being accustomed +to employ Phœnician or Egyptian sailors, the colony of Lydians, +which settled in Italy, might thus contain a mixture +of such people, and present those appearances which have led +some antiquarians to consider the Etruscans as Phœnicians or +Egyptians, while others have regarded them as Greeks. The +writers of antiquity, though varying in particulars, have followed, +in general, the tradition delivered by Herodotus concerning + the descent of the Etruscans. Cicero, Strabo<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Geograph.</hi> Lib. V. c. 2.</note>, Velleius + Paterculus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Histor. Roman.</hi> Lib. I. c. 1.</note>, Seneca, Pliny, Plutarch<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Quæstiones Romanæ</hi>.</note>, and Servius, all +affirm that they came from Lydia; and to these may be added +Catullus, who calls the lake Benacus <hi rend="italic">Lydiæ lacus undæ</hi>, obviously +because he considered the <anchor id="corr021"/><corr sic="antient">ancient</corr> Etruscans, within +whose extended territory it lay, as of Lydian origin. It is +evident, too, that the Etruscans themselves believed that they +had sprung from the Lydians, and that they inculcated this +belief on others. Tacitus informs us, that, in the reign of +Tiberius, a contest concerning their respective antiquity arose +among eleven cities of Asia, which were heard by their deputies +in presence of the Emperor. The Sardians rested their +claims on an alleged affinity to the Etruscans, and, in support +of their pretensions, produced an ancient decree, in which that +people declared themselves descended from the followers of +Tyrrhenus, who had left their native country of Lydia, and + founded new settlements in Italy<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Annal.</hi> Lib. IV. c. 55.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Hellanicus of Lesbos, a Greek historian, nearly contemporary +with Herodotus, and quoted by Dionysius of Halicarnassus, +asserted that the Etruscans were a tribe of Pelasgi, not from +Lydia, but from Greece, who being driven out of their country +by the Hellenes, sailed to the mouth of the Po, and leaving +their ships in that river, built the inland town of Cortona, +whence advancing, they peopled the whole territory afterwards + called Tyrrhenia<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Antiquitates Romanæ</hi>. Lib. I. p. 22. Ed. Sylburg, 1586.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Dionysius of Halicarnassus holds the account of those authors, +who maintain that the Etruscans were descended from +the Lydians, to be utterly fabulous, principally on the ground +<pb n="22"/><anchor id="Pg022"/>that Xantus, the chief historian of Lydia, says nothing of any +colony having emigrated thence to Italy; and he is of opinion, +that those also are mistaken, who, like Hellanicus of Lesbos, +believed the Etruscans and Pelasgi to be the same people. +He conceives them to have been Aborigines, or natives of the +country, as they radically agreed with no other nation, either +in their language or manner of life. He admits, however, that +a tribe of Pelasgi passed from Thessaly to the mouth of the +Po many ages previous to the Trojan war, and directing their +course to the south, occupied a considerable portion of the +heart of Italy. Soon after their arrival, they assisted the aboriginal +Etruscans in their wars with the Siculi, whom they +forced to seek refuge in Sicily, the seat of the ancient Sicani. +Subsequent to this alliance, they were again dispersed in +consequence of disease and famine; but a few still remained +behind, and being incorporated with the original inhabitants, +bestowed on them whatever in language or customs appeared +to be common to the Etruscans, with other nations of Pelasgic + descent<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Antiquitates Romanæ</hi>. Lib. I. p. 22, &c.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Several eminent writers among the moderns have partly +coincided with Dionysius. Dempster seems to think that +there was an indigenous population in Etruria, but that it was +increased both by the Lydian emigration and by colonies of + Pelasgi from Greece<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Etruria Regali</hi>. Lib. I. Ed. Florent. 1723. 2 tom. fol.</note>. Bochart is nearly of the same opinion; +only he farther admits of a direct intercourse between +the Etruscans and Phœnicians, whence the former may have +received many Oriental fables and customs. He denies, however, +that there was any resemblance in the languages of +these two people; and the Etruscan arts he believes to have + been chiefly derived from Greece<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Geographia Sacra</hi>, De Coloniis Phœnicum. Lib. I. tom. I. p. 582, &c. <hi rend="italic">Oper.</hi> + Lugd. Bat. 1712.</note>. The opinion of Bochart +on these latter points is so much the more entitled to weight, +as his prepossessions would have led him to maintain an opposite +system could it have been plausibly supported. Gibbon +also declares in favour of Dionysius; and, as to the relation +of Herodotus, he says, <q>L’opinion d’Herodote, qui les + fait venir de la Lydie, ne peut convenir qu’aux poetes</q><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Miscellaneous Works</hi>, Vol. IV. p. 184. Ed. 8vo. 1814.</note>. +Several recent Italian writers likewise have maintained, that, +previous to the arrival of any Lydian or Pelasgic colony, there +existed what they term an indigenous population, by which +they do not merely signify a population whose origin cannot +<pb n="23"/><anchor id="Pg023"/>be traced, since they hint pretty broadly, that Etruria had its + Adam and Eve as much as Eden<note place="foot">Micali, <hi rend="italic">L’Italia avanti il Dominio dei Romani</hi>. Ed. Firenz. 1810. Bossi, + <hi rend="italic">Istoria d’Italia</hi>. Ed. 1819.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Gorius derives every thing Etruscan from Egypt or Phœnicia. +These countries he considers as the original seats of the Pelasgi, +who, being driven out of them, settled in Achaia, Thrace, +Arcadia, and Lydia, and from these regions gradually, and at + different times, passed into Italy<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Museum Etruscum</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +A similar system has been adopted by Lord Monboddo.—From +a resemblance in their letters and language to those of +the Greeks, he believes the Etruscans to have been a very ancient +colony of the roaming Pelasgi who left Arcadia in quest +of new settlements. These Pelasgi, however, he maintains, +were not themselves indigenous in Arcadia, as they issued +originally from Egypt, where there was a district and a city + of the name of Arcadia<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Origin and Progress of Language</hi>, vol. V. book i. c. 3. See also Swinton, + <hi rend="italic">De Lingua Etruriæ Vernacula</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Mazzochi follows the oriental theory, but does not venture +to determine from what eastern region the Etruscans emigrated. +He merely affirms, that they spread from the east, under which +term he includes regions very remote from each other—Assyria, + Armenia, Canaan, and Egypt<note place="foot">At the end of his Dissertation he alludes to a future work, in which he is to settle + the particular district and time of the Etruscan emigration; but I do not know + whether or not he ever accomplished this undertaking.</note>. He also thinks that they +came directly from the east, without having previously passed +through Lydia or Arcadia: For, if they had, the monuments +of these latter countries would exhibit (which they do not) +still stronger remains of oriental antiquity than those of the +Etruscans. This descent Mazzochi attempts to confirm by +the most fanciful derivations of words and proper names of +the Etruscan nation from the eastern languages, especially +from the Hebrew and Syriac. Thus one of the most extensive +plains in Italy, and the spot where, in all probability, the +oriental colony first landed, is near the æstuary of the Po. +This plain they naturally called Paddan, one of the names of +the level Mesopotamia, and the appellation of the district soon +came to be transferred to the river Padus or Po, by which it +was bounded. It occurred to the author, however, that the +Eridanus was the more ancient name of the Po; but this only +furnishes him with a new argument. Eraz, it seems, signifies +in Hebrew, a cedar, or any sort of resinous tree, and the orientals, +finding a number of trees of this nature on the banks +of the Po, and Z being a convertible letter with D, they could +<pb n="24"/><anchor id="Pg024"/>not fail to call the river, near which they grew in such abundance, + the Eridanus<note place="foot"><q>Confesso ingenuamente,</q> says the author, <q>che questa Etimologia della voce + Eridano mi è sempre piaciuta assai.</q>—<hi rend="italic">Dissertaz. sopra l’Origine de Terreni, + nell Saggi di Dissert. dell Acad. Etrusca</hi>. Tom. III. p. 1.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Bonarota has deduced the origin of the Etruscans from +Egypt—a theory which has chiefly been grounded on the resemblance +of the remains of their arts with the monuments of + the ancient Egyptians<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Supplem. ad Monument. Etrusc. Dempst.</hi> c. 47. See also Riccobaldi del + Bava, <hi rend="italic">Dissertaz. sopra L’Origine dell’ Etrusca Nazione</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Maffei brings them directly from Canaan, and supposes +them to have been the race expelled from that region by the +Moabites, or children of Lot. The river Arnon, (whence +Arno,) flowed not far from that part of Canaan, where Lot +and Abram first sojourned; one of its districts was called +Etroth, (whence Etruria); and on the banks of the Arnon +stood the city Ar, a syllable which is a frequent compound in +Etruscan appellatives. The Etruscans erected their places of +worship on hills or high places—they formed corporeal images +of their divine beings like the idolatrous race from +whom they sprung—but above all, their divinations and profession +of augury, identified them with those original inhabitants +of Canaan, of whom it is said, <q>that they <anchor id="corr024"/><corr sic="harkened">hearkened</corr> unto + observers of times and unto diviners</q><note place="foot">Deutoronomy, c. 18, v. 14. <hi rend="italic">Ragionament. degl’ Itali primitivi. in Istoria + Diplomatica</hi>. Ed. Mantua, 1727.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +By far the most voluminous, but at the same time one of +the most fanciful writers concerning the Etruscans, is Guarnacci, +who maintains, that they came directly from the east, +and were stragglers who had been dispersed by Noah’s flood, +or, at the very latest, by the confusion at Babel. The Umbri +and Aborigines, according to him, were the same people, under +a different denomination, as the Etruscans: They gradually +spread themselves over all Italy, and some tribes of them, +called, from their wandering habits, Pelasgi, at length emigrated +to Greece and Lydia; so that, whatever similarity has +been traced in the language, religion, manners, or arts, of the +Greeks and Etruscans, is the consequence of the Etruscan +colonization of Greece, and not, as is generally supposed, of +Italy having been peopled by Pelasgic colonies from Arcadia + or Peloponnesus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Origini Italiche</hi>. 3 Tom. folio. Lucca, 1767–72.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +In general, the oriental system has been maintained in opposition +to all other theories, chiefly on the ground that the +Etruscans, like many eastern nations, wrote from right to left, +and that, like the Hebrews, they often marked down only +<pb n="25"/><anchor id="Pg025"/>the consonants, leaving the reader to supply the auxiliary +vowels. +</p> + +<p> +The oriental theory, in all its modifications, has been strenuously +opposed by a number of learned Italian, French, and +German antiquaries, who have contended for the northern +and Celtic origin of the Etruscans, and have ridiculed the +opinions of their predecessors as if they themselves were +about to promulgate a more rational system. Bardetti, while +he admits a colonization of Italy from foreign quarters, prior +even to the Trojan war, maintains, that it was inhabited by a +primitive population long before the landing of the Lydians +or Pelasgi: That previous to the arrival of the latter tribe at +the mouth of the Po, which happened 300 years before the +siege of Troy, there had been no navigation to Italy from +Egypt, or any other country: That, therefore, this primitive +population must have come by land, and could have been no +other than bands of Celts who were the immediate posterity +of Japheth, and who, having originally settled in Gaul, descended +to Italy from the Alps by Rhetium, Tirol, and Trent. +Their first seats were the regions along the banks of the Po; +the earliest tribes of their population were called Ligurians +and Umbrians, and from them sprung the Etrurians, and all + the other ancient nations of Italy<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Primi Abitatori dell Italia</hi>. Ed. Modena, 1769. 3 Tom. 4to.</note>. +</p> + +<p> + A system nearly similar has been followed by Pelloutier<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Histoire des Celtes</hi>. Paris, 1770.</note>, + Freret<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Recherches sur l’Origine des Differens Peuples d’Italie</hi>, in <hi rend="italic">l’Hist. de l’Acad. + des Inscriptions</hi>. Tom. XVIII.</note>, and Funccius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Origine Latinæ Linguæ</hi>. Ed. 1720.</note>, and has been adopted, with some + modifications, by Adelung, and also by Heyne<note place="foot">Heyne, <hi rend="italic">Opuscula Academica</hi>, Tom. V. See also Court de Gebelin, <hi rend="italic">Monde + Primitif</hi>.</note>, who, however, +admits that other tribes besides the Gallic race, may + have contributed to the population of Etruria<note place="foot">Non enim Etruscorum stirpem ab una gente nec ab una turba deductam; sed + temporum successu plurium populorum propagines in eum populum, qui tandem + Etruscum nomen terris his allevit confluxisse arbitror. <hi rend="italic">Nov. Comment. Soc. Reg. + Gotting.</hi> Tom. III.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +This theory, whether deducing the Etruscans from the Celts +of Gaul or from the Teutonic tribes of Germany, is too often +supported by remote and fanciful etymologies; and, so far as +depends on authority, it chiefly rests on an ambiguous passage +of the ancient historian Boccus, (quoted by Solinus,) +where it is said, <hi rend="italic">Gallorum veterum propaginem Umbros esse</hi>, +and taken in connection with this, the assertion of Pliny, + <hi rend="italic">Umbrorum gens antiquissima Italiæ existimatur</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Nat. Hist.</hi> Lib. III. c. 14. Ed. Hardouin.</note>. +</p> + </div> + <div> + <pb n="26"/><anchor id="Pg026"/> + <index index="pdf" level1="Etruria"/><index index="toc" level1="Etruria"/> +<head>ETRURIA.</head> + +<p> +The most learned and correct writer on the subject of the + Etruscans is Lanzi. In his elaborate work<note place="foot">Visconti, who has since become so celebrated by his <hi rend="italic">Iconographie Grecque + et Romaine</hi>, says in the <hi rend="italic">Approvazione</hi> of the work of Lanzi, which he had perused + in his official capacity,—<q>Il saggio di lingua Etrusca, che ho letto per commissione + del Rmo. P. M. del S. P. A., mi è sembrato assolutamente il miglior libro che sia + stato sinora scritto su questo difficile e vasto argomento.</q> This opinion, so early + formed, has been confirmed by that of all writers who have subsequently touched + on the subject.</note>, (in which he has +followed out and improved on a system first started by Ulivieri,) +he does not pretend to investigate the origin of this celebrated +race, though he seems to think that they were Lydians, +augmented from time to time by tribes of the Pelasgi. But +he has tried to prove that whatever may have been their descent, +the religion, learning, language, and arts of the Etruscans +must be referred to a Greek origin, and he refutes Gori +and Caylus, who, deceived by a few imperfect analogies, ascribed +them to the Egyptians. The period of Etruscan perfection +in the arts, and formation of those vases and urns +which we still admire, was posterior, he maintains, to the +subjugation of Etruria by the Romans, and at a time when an +intercourse with Greece had rendered the Etruscans familiar +with models of Grecian perfection. As to the language, he +does not indeed deny that all languages came originally from +the east, and that many Greek words sprung from Hebrew +roots; but there are in the Etruscan tongue, he asserts, such +clear traces of Hellenism, particularly in the names of gods +and heroes, that it is impossible to ascribe its origin to any +other source. In particular, he attempts to show from the inscriptions +on the Eugubian tables, that the Etruscan language +was the Æolic Greek, since it has neither the monosyllables +characteristic of northern tongues, nor the affixes and suffixes + peculiar to oriental dialects<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Saggio di Lingua Etrusca</hi>. Rom. 1789. 3 Tom. 8vo.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +From whatever nation originally sprung, the Etruscans at +an early period attained an enviable height of prosperity and +power. Etruria Proper, or the most ancient Etruria, reached +from the Arno to the Tiber, being nearly bounded all along +by these rivers, from their sources to their junction with the +Tyrrhenian sea. Soon, however, the Etruscans passed those +narrow limits;—to the north, they spread their conquests over +the Ligurians, who inhabited the region beyond the Arno, +and to this territory the conquerors gave the name of New +Etruria. To the south, they crossed the Tiber, made allies +or tributaries of the Latins, and introduced among them many +of their usages and rites. Having thus opened a way through +Latium, they drove the Osci from the fertile plains of Cam<pb n="27"/><anchor id="Pg027"/>pania, and founded the city of Capua, about fifty years before +the building of Rome. Colonies, too, were sent out by them +to spots beyond their immediate sway, till at length the Italian +name was nearly sunk in that of the Etruscans. Their +minds, however, were not wholly bent on conquest and political +<anchor id="corr027"/><corr sic="agrandizement">aggrandizement</corr>; their attention was also directed to useful +institutions, and to the cultivation of the fine arts. The +twelve confederated cities of Etruria were embellished with +numberless monuments of architecture; wholesome laws were +enacted, commerce was extended along all the shores of the +Mediterranean: and, in short, by their means the general progress +of civilization in Italy was prodigiously accelerated. +The glory and prosperity of the Etruscans were at their +height before Rome yet possessed a name. But their government, +like that of all other republics, contained the seeds of +decay. Each state had the choice of remaining as a commonwealth, +or electing a king; but the Kings, or Lucumons, as +they were usually called, were only the priests and presidents +of the different cities of the confederation. There was no +monarch of the whole realm; and it is the series of these Lucumons +that has swelled the confused list of kings presented +by Etruscan antiquaries. Each state had also the privilege +of separately declaring war or concluding peace; and each +appears, on all occasions, to have been more anxious for its +own safety, than for the general interests of the union. Hence, +rivalships and dissensions prevailed in the general assemblies +of the twelve states. A confederate government, thus united +by a link of political connection, almost as feeble as the Amphictyonic +council of Greece, afforded no such compact resistance +as could oppose an adequate barrier to the <hi rend="italic">unica vis</hi> +of the intrepid enemies with whom the Etruscans had now to +contend. At sea they were assailed by the Syracusans and +Carthaginians; the Umbrians retook several of their ancient +possessions; they were forced to yield the plains which lie +between the Alps and Apennines to the valour of the Gauls; +and the Samnites expelled them from the yet more desirable +and delicious regions of Campania. +</p> + +<p> +While the Etruscans were thus again confined almost within +the territory which still bears their name, and extends from +the Tiber northward to the Apennines, a yet more formidable +foe than any they had hitherto encountered appeared on the +political theatre of Italy. It was Latium, which had the singular +fortune to see one of its towns rise to the supreme dominion +of Italy, and finally of the world. This city, which +Dionysius of Halicarnassus represents as a respectable colony, +fitted out from Alba under the escort of Romulus, and thence +<pb n="28"/><anchor id="Pg028"/>supplied with money, provisions, and arms; but which was +more probably composed of outlaws from the Equi, Marsi, +Volsci, and other Latian tribes, had gradually acquired +strength, while the power of the Etruscans had decayed. Enervated + by opulence and luxury<note place="foot">Diodorus Siculus—Athenæus.</note>, they were led to despise +the rough unpolished manners of the Romans; but during +centuries of almost incessant warfare, they were daily taught +to dread their military skill and prowess. The fall of Veii +was a tremendous warning, and they now sought to preserve +their independence rather by stratagem than force of arms. +At length, in an evil hour, they availed themselves of the difficulties +of their enemy; and, while the rival republic was +pressed on the south by the Samnites, they leagued with those +northern hordes which descended from the Alps to the anticipated +conquest of Rome. Before they had fully united with +the Gauls, the Consul Dolabella annihilated, near the Lake +Vadimona, the military population of Etruria, and the feeble +remains of the nation received the imperious conditions of +peace, dictated by the victors, which left them nothing but +the shadow of a great name,—the glory of attending the Roman +march to the conquest of the world, and the vestiges of +arts destined to attract the curiosity and research of the latest +posterity. +</p> + +<p> +The vicinity of the <anchor id="corr028"/><corr sic="Estruscans">Etruscans</corr> to Rome, from which their +territories were separated only by the Tiber,—the alliance of +their leader, Cœlius, with Romulus, and the habitation assigned +them on the Cœlian Mount,—the accession to the Roman +sovereignty of the elder Tarquin, who was descended +from a Greek family which had fixed its residence in Etruria,—the +settlement of a number of Etruscan prisoners, four years +after the expulsion of the kings, in a street called the <hi rend="italic">Vicus +Tuscus</hi>, in the very heart of the city;—and, finally, the intercourse +produced by the long period of warfare and political +intrigue which subsisted between the rising republic and +their more polished neighbours before they were incorporated +into one state, would be sufficient to account for the Roman +reception of the customs and superstitions of Etruria, as also +for the interchange of literary materials. It does not seem +that the hostility of rival nations prevents the reciprocal adoption +of manners and literature. The romantic gallantry and +learning of the Arabs in the south of Spain soon passed the +limits of their splendid empire; and long before the conquest +of Wales the Cambrian fables and traditions concerning +Arthur and his host of heroes were domesticated in the court +<pb n="29"/><anchor id="Pg029"/>of England. Accordingly, we find that the Romans were +indebted to the Etruscans for the form of the robes which +invested their magistrates, the pomp that attended their +triumphs, and even the music that animated their legions. The +purple vest, the sceptre surmounted by an eagle, the curule +chair, the fasces and lictors, were the ensigns and accompaniments +of supreme authority among the Etruscans; while the +triumphs and ovations, the combats of gladiators and Circensian +games, were common to them and the Romans. +</p> + +<p> +The simple and rustic divinities of Etruria and Latium were +likewise the objects of Roman idolatry, long before the introduction +of that more imposing and elegant mythology which +had been embellished by the conceptions of Homer and the +hand of Phidias. Saturn, the reformer of civil life, though +afterwards confounded with the Kronos of the Greeks, was not +of Greek origin. Janus, the <hi rend="italic">Deorum Deus</hi> of the Salian +verses, to whom the Romans offered their first sacrifices, and +addressed their first prayers, and whom system-framers have + identified with Noah<note place="foot"><anchor id="corr029"/><corr sic="Guarnicci">Guarnacci</corr>, <hi rend="italic">Origini Italiche</hi>.</note>, the Indian Ganesa<note place="foot">Sir William Jones, <hi rend="italic">On the Gods of Italy and India</hi>.</note>, the Egyptian + Oannes<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Herculanensia</hi>, Dissert. V.</note>, and the Ion of the Scandinavians<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Hermes Scythicus</hi>, p. 90.</note>, or have represented +as a symbolic type of all things in nature, was truly an +Italian God:— +</p> + +<lg> + <l><q>Nam tibi par nullum Græcia numen habet<note place="foot">Ovid. <hi rend="italic">Fast.</hi> I. 90.</note>.</q> +</l> +</lg> + +<p> +Faunus and Picus, Bona Dea and Marica, were Etruscan or +Latian divinities of the Saturnian family. Italy was also filled +with many local deities, in consequence of those wonderful +natural phænomena which it so abundantly exhibited, and +which its early inhabitants ascribed to invisible powers. A +sulphuric lake was the residence of the Nymph Albunea, and +the medicinal founts of Abano were the acknowledged abodes +of a beneficent genius.—<q>Nullus lucus sine fonte, nullus fons +non sacer, propter attributos illis deos, qui fontibus præesse + dicuntur<note place="foot">Servius, ad Æneid. VII. 84.</note>.</q> All nature was thus linked by a continued chain +of consecrated existence, from the God of Thunder to the +simple Faun. The Vacunia and Feronia of the Sabines were +naturalized by Numa, and the Vejove of Etruria presided in +Rome at the general council of the twelve greater gods, long +before a knowledge of the Grecian Mars or Jupiter. In all + their mythology we may remark the grave and austere charac<pb n="30"/><anchor id="Pg030"/>ter of the ancient Italians<note place="foot"> + <!-- poem --> + <lg><l>L’Olympe de Numa fut plus majestueux,</l> + <l>Mercure moins fripon, Mars moins voluptueux;</l> + <l>Jupiter brula moins d’une flamme adultere,</l> + <l>Venus meme reçut une culte plus severe.</l> + <l rend="margin-left: 14"><hi rend="italic">De Lille.</hi> <hi rend="italic">Imagination</hi>. Ch. vi.</l> + </lg></note>. Their deities resembled not the +obscene and <anchor id="corr030"/><corr sic="vitious">vicious</corr> gods of Greece. They presided over +agriculture, the rights of property, conjugal fidelity, truth and +justice; and in like manner in early Rome, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Cana Fides et Vesta; Remo cum fratre Quirinus</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Jura dabant.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Dionysius of Halicarnassus particularly points out the difference +between the religion of the Greeks and the Romans. +The latter, he informs us, <q>did not admit into their creed those +impious stories told by the Greeks of the castration of their +gods, or of destroying their own children, of their wars, wounds, +bonds, and slavery, and such like things as are not only altogether +unworthy of the divine nature, but disgrace even the human. +They had no wailing and lamentations for the sufferings +of their gods, nor like the Greeks, any Bacchic orgies, or vigils +of men and women together in the temples. And if at any +time they admitted such foreign pollutions, as they did with +regard to the rites of Cybele and the Idæan goddess, the ceremonies +were performed under the grave inspection of Roman +magistrates; nor even now does any Roman disguise himself + to act the mummeries performed by the priests of Cybele<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Antiquitat. Roman.</hi> Lib. II. c. 19.</note></q>. +Dionysius, who refers every thing to Greece, thinks that the +early Roman was just the Greek religion purified by Romulus, +to whom, in fact, his country was more indebted than to Numa +for its sacred institutions. In reality, however, this superior +purity of rites and worship was not occasioned by any such +lustration of the Greek fables, but from their being founded +on Italian, and not on Grecian superstitions. +</p> + +<p> +But although the Etruscan mythology may have been more +pure, and its rites more useful, than those of Greece, its fables +were not so ingenious and alluring. Ora, the goddess of +health and youth, was less elegant than Hebe; and even the +genius of Virgil, who has chosen the Italian <hi rend="italic">Myths</hi> for the +machinery of the Æneid, could hardly bestow grace or dignity +on the prodigy of the swarm of bees that hung in clusters +from the Laurentian Laurel—on the story of the robber Cacus +vomiting flames, the ships metamorphosed into nymphs, the +sow which farrowed thirty white pigs, and thereby announced +that the town of Alba would be built in thirty years, the puerile +<pb n="31"/><anchor id="Pg031"/>fiction of the infancy of Camilla, or the hideous harpy which +hovered round the head of Turnus, and portended his death. +Accordingly, when the Romans were allured by the arts of +Greece, the rude and simple traditions of Italian mythology +yielded to the enticing and voluptuous fictions of a more polished + people<note place="foot">Beaufort is of opinion that the gradual introduction of the Greek mythology at + Rome commenced as early as the reign of Tarquinius Priscus. <hi rend="italic">La Republique + Romaine. Discours Preliminaire</hi>. Ed. 1766. 2 Tom. 4to.</note>. The tolerant spirit of Polytheism did not +restrict the number of gods, and the ministers of superstition +seemed always ready to reconcile the most discordant systems. +Hence the poet interwove the national traditions with +the Greek fables, and concentrated in one the attributes of +different divinities. Thus, the Greek Kronos was identified +with Saturn; the rustic deities, Sylvanus and Faunus, peculiar +to Latium, being confounded with Pan, the Satyrs, and Silenus, +were associated with the train of Bacchus; Portumnus +was converted into Palemon—a deity whom the Greeks had +received from Phœnicia; Bona Dea was transformed to Hecate, +and Libitina to Proserpine; and the Camesnæ, or Camenæ, of +the family of Janus, who prophesied in Saturnian verse on the +summit of Mount Janiculum, were metamorphosed into + Muses<note place="foot">Heyne, Excurs. V. lib. vii. ad Æneid.</note>. Hercules, Jupiter, and Venus, gods of power and +pleasure, occupied, with their splendid temples, the place of +the peaceful and pastoral deities of Numa. Still, however, +the national religion was in some measure retained, and Apollo +and Bacchus, in particular, continued to be decorated with +the characteristic emblems of Etruria. +</p> + +<p> +The Etruscans do not seem to have believed, like the Greeks, +that they were possessed of those interpretations of passing +events or revelations of futurity which were obtained by immediate +inspiration, whether delivered from the hill of Dodona, +or the Delphian shrine. Their divination was supposed to be +the result of experience and observation; and though not destitute +of divine direction or concurrence, depended chiefly on +human contrivance. Among them peculiar families, like the +tribe of Levi, the Peruvian Incas, and the descendants of Thor +and Odin, were depositaries of the secrets and ceremonies of +religion. Their prognostics were taken from the flight of + birds<note place="foot">Bentley, however, is of opinion that the College of Augurs, whose divination + was made from observations of birds, was of Roman institution, being founded by + Numa, and that the skill and province of the Haruspices of Etruria reached to three + things, <hi rend="italic">exta, fulgura, et ostenta</hi>, entrails of cattle, thunders, and monstrous births, + but did not include auguries from the flight of birds. <q>It often happened,</q> he adds, + <q>that this pack of Etruscan soothsayers gave their answers quite cross to what the Roman augurs had given, so that the two disciplines clashed.</q>—(<hi rend="italic">Remarks on a + late Discourse of Freethinking</hi>, p. 241, Lond. 1737.)</note>, the entrails of animals, and observations on thunder. +<pb n="32"/><anchor id="Pg032"/>In the early ages of Rome, a band of Patrician youths was +sent to Etruria, to be initiated in the mysteries of its religious + rites<note place="foot">Valerius Maximus, Lib. I. c. i. Ed. 1533. Cicero, <hi rend="italic">De Divinatione</hi>, Lib. I. c. + 41. Ed. <anchor id="corr032"/><corr sic="Schutz">Schütz</corr>.</note>. The constant practice of consulting the gods on all +enterprizes, public or private,—the belief, that prodigies manifested +the will of heaven, and that the deities could be +appeased, and their vengeance averted by expiations or sacrifices, +were common to the Tuscan and Roman creeds. In +short, the fervent spirit of Etrurian superstition passed undiminished +to the Romans, who owed to its influence much of +their valour, temperance, and patriotism. To this, Cicero in +a great degree ascribes their political supremacy. The Romans, +says he, were not superior in numbers to the Spaniards, +in strength or courage to the Gauls, in address to the Carthaginians, +in tactics to the Macedonians; but we surpass all nations +in that prime wisdom by which we have learned that all +things are governed and directed by the immortal gods. +</p> + +<p> +To the same singular people from whom they derived their +customs and superstitions, the Romans were much indebted +for their majestic language. As their writers in a great measure +owe their immortality to the lofty tones and commanding +accents of the Latin tongue, it would be improper entirely to +neglect its origin in entering on the literary history of Rome. +</p> + +<p> +The supporters of the various systems with regard to the first +peopling of Etruria, of course discover the elements of the +Etruscan language in that of the different nations by whom +they believe it to have been colonized. Lord Monboddo, for +example, deduces both the Latin and Etruscan from the old +Pelasgic; which language, he asserts, was first brought into +Italy by a colony of Arcadians, seventeen generations before +the Trojan war. He considers the Latin as the most ancient +dialect of the Greek; and he remarks, that as it came off from +the original stock earlier than the Doric, or Æolic, or any other +Greek dialect now known, it has more of the roughness of the +primitive Hebrew, from which he believes the Pelasgic to be + derived<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Origin, &c. of Language</hi>. Part I. book iii. c. 11.</note>. Lanzi also thinks that both the Latin and Etruscan +flowed from the Greek, and that the resemblance between the +Etruscan and Latin was not occasioned by the derivation of +the latter from the former, but was the necessary consequence +of both having sprung from a common source. +</p> + +<p> +It certainly is not easy to discover the primary elements of +the Latin or any other language; but its immediate origin +<pb n="33"/><anchor id="Pg033"/>may easily be traced. The inscriptions on the most ancient +monuments which have been discovered, from the Alps to +Calabria, shew that, from the time of the Etruscan supremacy, +there was an universal language in Italy, varied, indeed, by +dialects, but announcing a common origin in the inflections of +words and the forms of characters. The language of the +Etruscans had been so widely spread by their conquests, that +it might almost be regarded as the general tongue of Italy, +and the Latian, Oscan, and Sabine idioms, were in a great +measure the same with the Etruscan. From these the early +Latin language was chiefly formed; and what little Greek +existed in its original composition came through these languages +from the Pelasgic colonies, which in the remotest +periods had intermixed with the Etruscans, and with the +inhabitants of ancient Latium. <q>It is a great mistake,</q> says +Horne Tooke, <q>into which the Latin etymologists have fallen, +to suppose that all the Latin must be found in the Greek, for +the fact is otherwise. The bulk and foundation of the Latin +language is Greek; but great part of the Latin is the language +of our northern ancestors grafted on the Greek; and to +our northern languages the etymologist must go for that part + of the Latin which the Greek will not furnish<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Diversions of Purley</hi>. Part II. c. iv. Wakefield and Horne Tooke had undertaken + in conjunction a division and separation of the Latin language into two + parts, placing together, in one division, all that could be clearly shewn to be Greek, + and in the other, all that could be clearly shewn to be of northern extraction, including, + I presume, both Teutonic and Celtic originals. This design, we are + informed, was frustrated <q>by the persecution of that virtuous and harmless good + man, Mr Gilbert Wakefield.</q>—<hi rend="italic">Divers. Purley</hi>, II. 4. See also on the origin of + the Latin Language, <anchor id="corr033"/><corr sic="Ginguené">Ginguené,</corr> <hi rend="italic">Hist. Littéraire d’Italie</hi>, Tom. I.</note>.</q> This author +is correct, in affirming that all the Latin cannot be found in +the Greek; but he is far in error if he mean to maintain that +any part of the Latin came directly from the language of the +Celts, or that their uncouth jargon was grafted on the Greek. +The northern tongues, however, whether Celtic or Sclavonic, +may have contributed to form those dialects of Italy which +composed the original elements of the imperial language, and +were exhibited in great variety of combinations for five centuries +with little admixture of the Greek. The eminent grammarian +is still farther mistaken in declaring that the foundation +of the Latin language is Greek. That much of the Augustan +Latin is derived from the Greek, is true. Gataker, who +strenuously contends for the Greek origin of the whole Latin +language, has, as a specimen, attempted to shew, that every +word in the first five lines of Virgil’s Eclogues is drawn from + the Greek<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Novi Instrumenti Stylo</hi>, c. 1. London, 1648.</note>; and though part of his etymologies are fanciful, +<pb n="34"/><anchor id="Pg034"/>yet in a very considerable portion of them he has been completely +successful. But the case is totally different with the +ancient remnants of the Latin language previous to the capture +of Tarentum. In the song of the <hi rend="italic">Fratres Arvales</hi>, the oldest +specimen of the language extant, there seem to be only two +words which have any analogy to the Greek—<hi rend="italic">sal</hi> from + <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">ἅλς</foreign><!--[Greek: hals]--> +and <hi rend="italic">sta</hi> from <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">ἱστημι</foreign><!--[Greek: histêmi]-->. That there was little Greek incorporated +with the Latin during the first ages of the Republic, is evident +from the circumstance, that the Latin inscriptions of a former +period were unintelligible to the historian Polybius, and the +most learned Romans of his age. Now, as he himself was a +Greek, and as the most learned Romans, by his time, had +become good Greek scholars, any Grecisms in the ancient inscriptions +would have been perfectly intelligible. It is evident, +therefore, that the difficulty arose from the words of the old +Italian dialects occurring instead of the new Greek terms, +suddenly introduced after the capture of Tarentum, and to +which the Romans having by that time become habituated, +could not understand the language of a preceding generation. +Besides, when Rome was originally filled with Latian +bands—when the Etruscans and Oscans were immediately +beyond the walls of Rome,—when, as early as the time of +Romulus, the Sabines were admitted within them,—when all +the women then in Rome were Sabines, (from which it may +be presumed that much of the conversation was carried on in +the Sabine dialect,) and, above all, when the Romans, for many +centuries, had little intercourse with any other people than +the Italian nations, it is not to be supposed that they would +borrow their colloquial language from the Celts, on the other +side of the Alps, or the Greeks, from whom they were separated +by the Adriatic Gulf, and who, as yet, had established +only remote, insignificant, and scattered colonies, in Italy. +Varro, too, has shewn the affinity between the Sabine and the + Latin languages<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Lingua Latina</hi>, lib. IV. c. 10.</note>. That the Oscan resembled the old Latin, +is proved from its being constantly employed in the most popular +dramatic representations at Rome, and from the circumstance +that almost every word of its few relics which +remain, is the root of some equivalent Latin term. Thus +Akeru produced acerra—Anter, inter—Phaisnam, fanum—Tesaur, +Thesaurus—Famel, famulus—Multa, mulcta—Solum, +(totus,) solus—Facul, Facultas—Cael, cœlum—Embratur, + imperator.<note place="foot">Remondini, <hi rend="italic">Dissertaz. sopra una iscrizione Osca</hi>, p. 49. ed. 1760, Genoa. + Some writers have even asserted, that the Twelve tables were originally written in + the Oscan dialect. Terrasson, <hi rend="italic">Hist. de la Jurisprudence Romaine</hi>. Baron de + Theis, <hi rend="italic">Voyage de Polyclete</hi>, let. 15.</note> The copious admixture of Greek only took place +<pb n="35"/><anchor id="Pg035"/>after the taking of Tarentum, when the poets of Magna +Græcia settled at Rome, and were imitated by native writers, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 5"><q rend="post: none">—— Cum lingua Catonis <hi rend="italic">et Enni</hi></q></l> +<l>Sermonem patrium ditaverit, et nova rerum</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nomina protulerit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +So far, then, from the Latin language being composed of +Celtic grafted on the Greek, it appears to me to have been +formed from the Greek, grafted on those various dialects of +the Etruscan tongue, which prevailed in Italy at the period of +the building of Rome. +</p> + +<p> +It would have been singular, when the Romans derived so +much from their Etruscan neighbours, if they had not also +acquired a portion of those arts which were the chief boast +of Etruria. Among the Etruscans, the arts certainly had not +the imposing character they assumed in Egypt, or the elegance + they exhibited in Greece<note place="foot">It would be foreign to the object of this work to enter into the inquiry, whether + the Etruscan arts were the result of indigenous taste and cultivation, or were derived + from the Greeks. The latter proposition has been maintained by Winckelman + and Lanzi—the former by Tiraboschi and Pignotti. (<hi rend="italic">Storia di Toscana</hi>, T. 1. Ed. + Pisa, 1815.)</note>; but in their vases, tombs, +and altars, which have recently been brought to light, we +possess abundant proofs of their taste and ingenuity. In +these—domestic occupations, marriages, spectacles, masquerades, +contests in the Circus, equestrian exercises, the chase, +triumphs, mysteries, funeral rites, Lares, Lamiæ, Lemures, and +deities of every description,—in short, all ancient Etruria +passes in review before the eye, which, in many instances, +must admire the boldness of the attitudes, the elegance of the +draperies, and justness of the proportions. The art of modelling, +or sculpture, appears to have been that in which the +Etruscans chiefly excelled. The statues of the first kings +erected at Rome, in the reign of the elder Tarquin, were of +their workmanship, as well as that of Horatius Cocles, and the +equestrian statue of Clelia. The Jupiter of the Capitol was +also Tuscan; and the four-wheeled chariot placed in his temple, +received its last polish from Etruscan hands, under the +first Roman consuls. +</p> + +<p> +In the course of the 5th century of Rome, not fewer than +2000 Etruscan statues, which were probably little figures in +bronze, were carried to that city from Volsinium, (now Bolsena,) +which the Romans were accused of having besieged, in +order to plunder it of these treasures. Architecture was unknown +in Rome until the Tarquins came from Etruria: hence +the works of the kings, some of which still remain, were +<pb n="36"/><anchor id="Pg036"/>built in the Etruscan style, with large and regular, but uncemented + blocks<note place="foot">Forsyth’s <hi rend="italic">Remarks on Italy</hi>, p. 141.</note>. The most ancient and stupendous architectural +monuments of Rome, were executed by Etruscan +artists. Theirs were the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, the +Circus, and Cloaca Maxima, which showed such a wonderful + anticipation of the future magnitude of Rome<note place="foot"><q>La grandeur de Rome,</q> says Montesquieu, <q>parût bientòt dans ses edifices + publics. Les ouvrages qui ont donné, et qui donnent encore aujourd’hui la plus + haute idée de sa puissance ont été faits sous les Rois. On commençoit déjà a batir + la Ville eternelle.</q> <hi rend="italic">Grandeur et Decadence des Romains</hi>, c. 1.</note>, and which +Livy pronounces equal to anything which had been produced +by modern magnificence. Painting, too, was introduced at +Rome from the Etruscans, about the middle of the fifth century, +by one of the Fabian family, who had long resided in +Etruria, and who himself painted in <hi rend="italic">fresco</hi>, after his return, +the interior of the Temple of Salus, and transmitted the sirname +of <hi rend="italic">Pictor</hi> to his descendants. +</p> + +<p> +The excellence to which the Etruscans had attained in +sculpture and architecture, forms a presumption of their proficiency +in those sciences which are essential to eminence in +the arts. As not a vestige of their writings remains, it is impossible +to judge of the merits of their literary compositions. +I suspect, however, that, like the ancient Egyptians, they had +made much less progress in literature than in arts or science. +What books they had, were extant, and well known, at Rome; +yet Cicero and other Latin writers, who have the Greek authors +perpetually in their mouths, scarcely ever allude to any +works of the Etruscans, except treatises on augury or divination; +and the only titles of the books, recorded by Roman +writers, are the Libri Fatales, Libri Haruspicinæ, Sacra Acherontia, +Fulgurales et Rituales Libri. It is said, indeed, that +the Etruscans cultivated a certain species of poetry, sung or +declaimed during the pomp of sacrifices, or celebration of + marriages<note place="foot">Dempster, <hi rend="italic">Etruria Regalis</hi>, Lib. III. c. 80.</note>. Such verses were first employed in Fescennia, +a city of Etruria, whence the ancient nuptial hymns of the +Romans were called Fescennine. It is evident, however, that +these Etruscan songs, or hymns, were of the very rudest description, +and probably never were reduced into writing. +They were a kind of <hi rend="italic">impromptus</hi>, composed of scurrilous +jests, originally recited by the Italian peasants at those feasts +of Ceres, which celebrated the conclusion of their harvests; +and they resembled the verses described in the well-known +lines of Horace— +</p> + +<pb n="37"/><anchor id="Pg037"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Agricolæ prisci, fortes, parvoque beati,</q></l> +<l>Condita post frumenta, levantes tempore festo</l> +<l>Corpus, et ipsum animum spe finis dura ferentem,</l> +<l>Cum sociis operum pueris, et conjuge fidâ,</l> +<l>Tellurem porco, Sylvanum lacte piabant,</l> +<l>Floribus et vino Genium, memorem brevis ævi;</l> +<l>Fescennina per hunc inventa <anchor id="corr037"/><corr sic="licenta ">licentia</corr> morem</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Versibus alternis opprobria rustica fudit<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. Ep. 1.</note>.</q> </l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It appears, also, that some of the ancient rustic oracles and +prophecies of the Etruscans, were delivered in a rugged sort +of verse called Saturnian—a measure which was adopted from +them by the earliest Latin poets— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 13"><q rend="post: none">Scripsere alii rem</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Versibus quos olim Fauni vatesque canebant<note place="foot">Ennius, <hi rend="italic">Annal.</hi></note>.</q> </l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Censorinus informs us, on the authority of Varro, that this +ancient people was not without its chroniclers and historians—<hi rend="italic">In + Tuscis Historiis quæ octavo eorum sæculo scripta sunt</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Die Natali</hi>, c. 5.</note>. +But this eighth century of the Etruscans, according to the +chronology followed by Lanzi, would be as late as the sixth + century of Rome<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Saggio di Ling. Etrusc.</hi> Tom. II. p. 567.</note>; and, besides, it is evident from the context +of Censorinus, that these pretended <hi rend="italic">histories</hi> were, in +fact, mere registers of the foundations of cities, and the births +and deaths of individuals. Varro also mentions Etruscan + tragedies composed by Volumnius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Ling. Lat.</hi> Lib. IV. c. 9.</note>. No date to his productions, +however, is specified, and Lanzi is of opinion, that he +did not write in Etruria till after the dramatic art had made +considerable progress at Rome; and it certainly may at least +be doubted, if, previous to that period, the Etruscan stage +had ever reached higher than extemporary recitations, or +pantomimic entertainments of music and dancing. +</p> + +<p> +But whatever the literature of the Etruscans may have been, +it certainly had no influence on the progress of learning among +the Romans. Neither the intercourse of the two nations, +nor the capture of Veii, though followed by the final subjugation +of the Etruscans, was attended with any literary improvement +on the part of their unpolished neighbours. In +fact, few nations have been more completely illiterate than +the Romans were, during five centuries, from the commencement +of their history; and of all the nations which have figured +in the annals of mankind, none certainly attained the +same height of power and grandeur, and civil wisdom, with +equal ignorance of literature or the fine arts. For the pretended +acquaintance of the elder Brutus with the Pythagorean +<pb n="38"/><anchor id="Pg038"/>philosophy, it would be difficult, I suspect, to find any better +authority than the romance of Clelia; and the learned academy, + which some writers<note place="foot">Orgival, <hi rend="italic">Considerat. sur l’Origine et Progrés des Belles Lettres chez les + Romains</hi>.</note> have found in Numa’s College of +Pontiffs, must be classed, I fear, with Vockerodt’s literary societies, + which existed before the flood<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Comment. de Erudit. Societat.</hi></note>. +</p> + +<p> +It is not difficult to account for this ignorance of the Romans +during the first ages of their history. Rome was not, as +has been asserted by Dionysius, a regular colony sent out from +a well-regulated state, but was formed from a mixture of all +kinds of people unacquainted with social life. It consisted of +Romulus’ own troop, and a confluence of banditti inured to +lawless acts, and subsisting by rapine, who were called from +their fastnesses by the proclamation of a bold, cunning, and + hardy adventurer<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l>Romulus ut saxo locum circumdedit alto,</l> + <l rend="margin-left: 2">Cuilibet huc, inquit, confuge tutus erit.</l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>. This desperate band would not be much +softened or humanized by their union with the tribe of Sabines, +who, in the time of Romulus, became incorporated with the +state, if we may judge of Sabine civilization from the story of +Tarpeia. Numa did much for the domestic melioration of his +people: He subdivided them into classes, impressed their +minds with reverence for religion, and encouraged agriculture; +but there was no germ of literature which he could foster. +For more than three centuries after his death, the persevering +hostilities of neighbouring states, and the furious irruptions of +the Gauls, scarcely allowed a moment of repose or tranquillity. +The safety of Rome depended on its military preparations, and +every citizen necessarily became a soldier. Learning and +arts may flourish amid the wars and commotions of a mighty +empire, because every individual is not essentially or actively +involved in the struggle; but in a petty state, surrounded by +foes, all are in some shape or other personally engaged in the +conflict, and the result, perhaps, is viewed with intenser interest. +The enemies of Rome were repeatedly at her gates, and +once within her walls; and while the city thus resounded with +martial alarms, literary leisure could neither be enjoyed nor +accounted among the ingredients— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Vitam quæ faciunt beatiorem.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The exercise of arms, which commenced in order to preserve +the new-founded city from destruction, was continued +for the sake of conquest and dominion; so that the whole +<pb n="39"/><anchor id="Pg039"/>pride of the Romans was still placed in valour and military +success. At the first formation of their theatre, they were + propitiated by the address, <hi rend="italic">Belli duellatores optimi</hi><note place="foot">Plautus, <hi rend="italic">Captivi Prol.</hi></note>. Whatever +time could be snatched from warlike occupations, was +devoted to agriculture. Each individual had two acres allotted +to him, which he was obliged to till for the maintenance +of his family. While thus labouring for subsistence, he had +little leisure to cultivate literature or the arts, and could find +no inclination for such pursuits. Indeed, he was not allowed +the choice of his occupations. The law of Romulus which +consigned as ignominious all sedentary employments to foreigners +or slaves, leaving only in choice to citizens and freemen +the arts of agriculture and arms, long continued in undiminished +respect and observance. Romulus, says Dionysius, ordered +the same persons to exercise the employments both of +husbandmen and soldiers. He taught them the duty of soldiers +in time of war, and accustomed them in time of peace + to cultivate the land<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Antiquitat. Roman.</hi> Lib. II.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +During this period the Romans had nothing which can properly +be termed, or which would now be considered as poetry—the +shape in which literature usually first expands amongst +a rude people. The verses which have come down to us under +the character of Sibylline oracles, are not genuine. There +probably at one time existed a few rude lines uttered by pretended +prophetesses, and which were doubtless a political +instrument, usefully employed in a state subject to popular +commotions. The book delivered to Tarquin, and which was +supposed to contain those ancient oracles, perished amid the +conflagration in the Capitol, during the civil wars of Marius +and Sylla. Even those collected in Greece, and the municipal +states of Italy, in order to supply their place, and which were +deposited in the temple of Apollo, on Mount Palatine, were +burned by Stilicho in the reign of the Emperor Honorius. +There is still extant, however, the hymn sung by the <hi rend="italic">Fratres +Arvales</hi>, a college of priests instituted by Romulus, for the +purpose of walking in procession through the fields in the +commencement of spring, and imploring from the gods a blessing +on agriculture. Of a similar description were the rude +Saturnian verses prescribed by Numa, and which were chaunted +by the Salian priests, who carried through the streets those +sacred shields, so long accounted the Palladium of Rome. +</p> + +<p> +About the end of the fourth century from the building of +the city, when it was for the first time afflicted with a plague, +the Senate having exhausted without effect their own super<pb n="40"/><anchor id="Pg040"/>stitious ceremonies, and run over the whole round of supplications, +decreed that <hi rend="italic">histrions</hi> or players should be summoned +from Etruria, in order to appease the wrath of the gods by +scenic representations. These chiefly exhibited rude dances + and gesticulations, performed to the sound of the flute<note place="foot">Livy. Lib. VII. c. 2. Sine carmine ullo, sine imitandorum carminum actu, ludiones + ex Etruria acciti, ad tibicinis modos saltantes, haud indecoros motus more + Tusco dabant.</note>. +There was no dialogue or song, but the pantomime did not +consist merely of unmeaning gestures: It had a certain scope, + and represented a connected plot or story<note place="foot">Flogel, <hi rend="italic">Geschichte der Komisch. Litteratur</hi>. Tom. IV. p. 82.</note>; but what kind of +action or story was represented, is utterly unknown. This +whimsical sort of expiation seems to have attracted the fancy +of the Roman youths, who imitated the Etruscan actors; but +they improved on the entertainment, by rallying each other in +extemporary and jocular lines. The Fescennine verses, originally +employed in Etruria at the harvest-homes of the peasants, +were about the same period applied by the Romans to marriage +ceremonies and public diversions. +</p> + +<p> +There were also songs of triumph in a rude measure, which +were sung by the soldiers at the ovations of their leaders. As +early as the time of Romulus, when that chief returned triumphant +to Rome after his victory over the Ceninenses and Antemnates, +his soldiers followed him in military array, singing +hymns in honour of their gods, and extemporary verses in praise + of their commander<note place="foot">Dionys. Halic. Lib. II. c. 34.</note>. Of this description, too, were the +Pæans, with which the victorious troops accompanied the + chariot of Cincinnatus, after he subdued the Equi<note place="foot">Livy, Lib. III. c. 29. Epulantesque, cum carmine triumphali et solennibus + jocis, commissantium modo, currum secuti sunt.</note>, and with +which they celebrated a spirited enterprize of Cossus, a tribune + of the soldiers<note place="foot">Ibid. Lib. IV. c. 20. In eum milites carmina incondita, æquantes eum Romulo, + canere.</note>. Sometimes these laudatory songs were seasoned +with coarse jokes and camp jests, like those introduced + at the triumph of C. Claudius, and of M. Livius<note place="foot">Ibid. Lib. XXVIII. c. 9.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The triumphal hymns were not altogether confined to the +ceremony performed on the streets of Rome. Cicero informs +us, on the authority of Cato’s <hi rend="italic">Origines</hi>, that at feasts and +entertainments, it was usual for the guests to celebrate the + praises of their native heroes to the sound of the flute<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tusc. + Disput.</hi> Lib. I. c. 2. and lib. IV. c. 2. <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 19.</note>. Valerius +Maximus says, that the verses were sung by the older + guests, in order to excite the youth to emulation<note place="foot">Lib. II. c. 1.</note>; and Varro, +<pb n="41"/><anchor id="Pg041"/>that they were chaunted by ingenuous youths<note place="foot"> <hi rend="italic">De + Vita Populi Romani</hi>, ap. Nonium, c. ii. sub voce, Assa.</note>. The difference, +however, between the two authors, is easily reconciled. The + former speaks of the original composition of these ballads<note place="foot">Majores + natu in conviviis ad tibias egregia superiorum opera, carmine comprehensa, + pangebant.</note>, +while Varro, though the passage is imperfect, seems to refer +to a later period, when they were brought out anew for the +entertainment of the guests. Valerius talks of them as poems +or ballads of considerable extent. It was many generations, +however, before the age of Cato, that this practice existed; +and by the time of Cicero, these national and heroic productions, +if they ever had been reduced to writing, were + no longer extant<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 19. The passage rather seems to imply that they had been + in writing, <q>Utinam <hi rend="italic">extarent illa carmina</hi>, quæ multis sæculis ante suam ætatem + in epulis esse cantata a singulis convivis de clarorum virorum laudibus, in Originibus + scriptum reliquit Cato</q>!</note>. This is all that can be collected concerning +these legends, from the ancient Roman writers, who had +evidently very imperfect notions and information on the subject. +Niebuhr, however, and M. Schlegel, seem as well +acquainted with their contents as we are with Chevy Chase, +and talk as if these precious relics were lying on their shelves, +or as if they had been personally present at the festivals where +they were recited. They expressed, it seems, feelings purely +patriotic—they contained no inconsiderable admixture of the +marvellous—but even the propensity for what was incredible +was exclusively national in its character—and the Roman +fablers indulged themselves in the creation of no wonders, +which did not redound in some measure to the honour of their +ancestors. They were founded on the oldest traditions concerning +the kings and heroes of the infant city, and the establishment +of the republican form of government. <q>The +fabulous birth of Romulus,</q> says Schlegel, <q>the rape of the +Sabine women, the most poetical combat of the Horatii and +Curiatii, the pride of Tarquin, the misfortunes and death of +Lucretia, and the establishment of liberty by the elder Brutus—the +wonderful war with Porsenna, and steadfastness of +Scævola, the banishment of Coriolanus, the war which he +kindled against his country, the subsequent struggle of his +feelings, and the final triumph of his patriotism at the all-powerful +intercession of his mother;—these and the like circumstances, +if they be examined from the proper point of +view, cannot fail to be considered as relics and fragments of + the ancient heroic traditions and heroic poems of the Romans<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Lectures on Literature</hi>, Lect. III.</note>.</q> +Niebuhr, not contented with insulated ballads, has +<pb n="42"/><anchor id="Pg042"/>imagined the existence of a grand and complete Epopee, +commencing with the accession of Tarquinius Priscus, and + ending with the battle of Regillus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Romische Geschichte</hi>. Berlin, 1811. 2 Tom. 8vo.</note>. This is a great deal more +information than Cicero or Varro could have afforded us on +the subject. +</p> + +<p> +However numerous or extensive these ballads may have +been, they soon sunk into oblivion; and in consequence of +the overpowering influence of Greek authors and manners, +they never formed the groundwork of a polished system of +national poetry. The manifold witcheries of the Odyssey, and +the harmony of the noble Hexameter, made so entire a conquest +of the fancy and ears of the Romans, as to leave no +room for an imitation, or even an affectionate preservation, +of the ancient poems of their country, and led them, as we +shall soon see, exclusively to adopt in their stead, the thoughts, +the recollections, and the poetry of the Greeks. Cicero, in +his <hi rend="italic">Tusculan Disputations</hi>, mentions a poem by Appius + Claudius Cæcus, who flourished in the fifth century of Rome<note place="foot">Lib. IV. c. 2.</note>; +but he does not say what was the nature or subject of this +production, except that it was Pythagorean; and this is the +solitary authentic notice transmitted to us of the existence of +any thing which can be supposed to have been a regular or +continued poem, during the first five centuries that elapsed +from the building of the city. +</p> + +<p> +Since, then, we can discover, during this period, nothing +but those feeble dawings of dramatic, satiric, and heroic poetry, +which never brightened to a perfect day, the only history +of Roman literature which can be given during the long interval, +consists in the progress and improvement of the Latin +language. In the course of these five centuries, it was extremely +variable, from two causes.—1st, Although their policy +in this respect afterwards changed, one of the great +principles of aggrandizement among the Romans in their early +ages, was incorporating aliens, and admitting them to the +rights of citizens. Hence, there was a constant influx to +Rome of stranger tribes; and the dissonance within its walls +was probably greater than had yet been any where heard since +the memorable confusion at Babel.—2d, The Latin was +merely a spoken language, or at least had not received stability +by literary composition—writing at that time being +confined, (in consequence of the want of materials for it,) to +treaties, or short columnar inscriptions. So remarkable was +the fluctuation produced by these causes, even during a very +short period, that Polybius, speaking of a treaty concluded +<pb n="43"/><anchor id="Pg043"/>between the Carthaginians and Romans in the 245th Year of +the City, during the Consulship of Publius Valerius and Marcus +Horatius, declares, that the language used in it was so +different from the Latin spoken in his time, that the most + learned Romans could not explain its text<note place="foot">Lib. III. c. 22.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Of this changeable tongue, the earliest specimen extant, +and which is supposed to be as ancient as the time of Romulus, +is the hymn chaunted by the <hi rend="italic">Fratres Arvales</hi>, the college +of priests above-mentioned, who were called <hi rend="italic">Fratres</hi>, from +the first members of the institution being the sons of Acca +Laurentia, the nurse of Romulus. This song was inscribed, + during the time of the Emperor Heliogabalus<note place="foot">Bossi, <hi rend="italic">Storia de Italia</hi>, Tom. VI. p. 375.</note>, on a stone, +which was discovered on opening the foundations of the Sacristy +at St Peter’s, in the year 1778. It is in the following +words:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Enos Lases juvate,</q></l> +<l>Neve luerve Marmar sinis incurrer in pleoris.</l> +<l>Satur fufere Mars: limen sali sta berber:</l> +<l>Semones alternei advocapit cunctos.</l> +<l>Enos Marmor juvate,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Triumpe! triumpe!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These words have been thus interpreted by Herman: <q>Nos +Lares juvate, neve luem Mamuri sinis incurrere in plures. +Satur fueris Mars: limen (<hi rend="italic">i. e.</hi> postremum) sali sta vervex: +Semones alterni jam duo capit cunctos. Nos Mamuri juvato—Triumphe! + Triumphe</q><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Elementa Doctrinæ Metricæ</hi>, Lib. III. c. 9. Lanzi, (<hi rend="italic">Saggio di Ling. + Etrusc.</hi>) Schoell, (<hi rend="italic">Hist. Abregée de la Litterature Romaine</hi>, Tom. I. p. 42. introduct.) + and Eustace (<hi rend="italic">Classical Tour in Italy</hi>, Vol. III. p. 416.) give a somewhat + different interpretation. Pleores, they render flores, and not plures, in which + they seem right—Satur, fufere Mars, (you shall be full, O Mars!) they make Ator, + or ador fieri, Mars, (Let there be food, O Mars!) which is evidently erroneous. + The following will give some general notion of the import of the verses:— + <lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l>Ye Lares, aid us! Mars, thou God of Might!</l> + <l>From murrain shield the flocks—the flowers from blight.</l> + <l>For thee, O Mars! a feast shall be prepared;</l> + <l>Salt, and a wether chosen from the herd:</l> + <l>Invite, by turn, each Demigod of Spring—</l> + <l>Great Mars, assist us! Triumph! Triumph sing!</l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>! There are just sixteen letters used +in the above inscription; and it appears from it, that at this +early period the letter <hi rend="italic">s</hi> was frequently used instead of <hi rend="italic">r</hi>—that +the final <hi rend="italic">e</hi> was struck out, or rather, had not yet been added—the +rich diphthong <hi rend="italic">ei</hi> was employed instead of <hi rend="italic">i</hi>, and the +simple letter <hi rend="italic">p</hi>, in words where <hi rend="italic">f</hi> or <hi rend="italic">ph</hi> came afterwards to +be substituted. +</p> + +<p> +Of the <hi rend="italic">Carmen Saliare</hi>, sung by the Salian priests, appointed +under Numa, for the protection of the <hi rend="italic">Ancilia</hi>, or Sacred +<pb n="44"/><anchor id="Pg044"/>Shields, there remain only a few words, which have been cited +by Varro, who remarks in them, what has already been noticed +with regard to the Hymn of the <hi rend="italic">Fratres Arvales</hi>, that the letter +<hi rend="italic">s</hi> often occurs in words where his contemporaries placed +<hi rend="italic">r</hi>—as Melios, for melior—Plusima, for plurima—Asena, for + arena—Janitos, for janitor<note place="foot">Varro, <hi rend="italic">De Ling. Lat.</hi> Lib. VI. c. 1 and 3.</note>. The <hi rend="italic">Carmen Saliare</hi>, however, +can scarcely be taken as a fair specimen of the state of the +Roman language at the time it was composed. Among the +nations adjacent to Rome, there were Salian priests, who had + their hymns and solemn forms of invocation<note place="foot">Servius <hi rend="italic">ad Æneid.</hi> Lib. VIII.</note>, which are said + to have been, in part at least, adopted by Numa<note place="foot">Cannegieter, <hi rend="italic">Dissert. Philol. Jurid. ad legem Numæ</hi>.</note>. So that +his <hi rend="italic">Carmen Saliare</hi> probably approaches nearer to the Tuscan +and Oscan dialects, than the Latin language did, even at +that early period of the monarchy. +</p> + +<p> +The fragments of a few laws, attributed to Numa, have been +preserved by ancient jurisconsults and grammarians, and restored +by Festus, with much pains, to their proper orthography, +which had not been sufficiently attended to by those who first +cited passages from this <hi rend="italic">Regiam Majestatem</hi> of the Romans. +One of these laws, as restored by him, is in the following +terms:—<q>Sei cuips hemonem lobsum dolo sciens mortei duit +pariceidad estod. sei im imprudens se dolo malod occisit pro +capited oceisei et nateis eiius endo concioned arietem subicitod,</q> +which law may be thus interpreted: <q>Si quis hominem +liberum dolo sciens morti dederit parricida esto: Si cum imprudens, +sine dolo malo, occiderit, pro capite occisi et natis +ejus in concionem arietem subjicito.</q> A law, ascribed to +Servius Tullius, has been thus given by Festus:—<q>Sei parentem +puer verberit ast oloe plorasit, puer diveis parentum sacer +esto—sei nurus sacra diveis parentum esto,</q>—which means, +<q>Si parentem puer verberet, at ille ploraverit, puer divis parentum + sacer esto; si nurus, sacra divis parentum esto</q><note place="foot">Funccius, <hi rend="italic">De Pueritia Latin. Ling.</hi> c. III. § 6 and 8.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +From the date of these <hi rend="italic">Leges Regiæ</hi>, no specimen of the +Latin language is now extant, till we come down to the +Twelve Tables, enacted in the commencement of the fourth +century of Rome. These celebrated institutions have descended +to us in mutilated fragments, and their orthography +has probably been in some respects modernised: yet they bear +stronger marks of antiquity than the above-recited law of +Servius Tullius, or even than those of Numa. The Latin +writers themselves by whom they are quoted did not very well +understand them, owing to the change which had taken place +<pb n="45"/><anchor id="Pg045"/>in the language. Accordingly, Cicero, and the early grammarians +who cite them, have attempted rather to give the +meaning than the precise words of the Decemvirs. Terrasson +has endeavoured to bring them back to the old Oscan language, +in which he supposes them to have been originally written; +but his emendations are in a great measure conjectural, and +his attempt is one of more promise than fulfilment. On the +whole, they have been so much corrupted by modernising +them, and by subsequent attempts to restore them to the +ancient readings, that they cannot be implicitly relied on as +specimens of the Roman language during the period in which +they were promulgated. The laws themselves are very concise, +and free from that tautology, which seems the characteristic +of the enactments of nations farther advanced in +refinement. The first law is, <q>S’ in jus vocat queat,</q> which +is extremely elliptical in its expression, and means, <q>Si quis +aliquem in jus vocet, vocatus eat.</q> In some respects the language +of the <hi rend="italic">Leges Regiæ</hi>, and twelve tables, possesses a +richness of sound, which we do not find in more modern Latin, +particularly in the use of the diphthong <hi rend="italic">ai</hi> for <hi rend="italic">æ</hi>, as vitai for +vitæ, and of the diphthong <hi rend="italic">ei</hi> for <hi rend="italic">i</hi>, as sei for si. Horace might +perhaps be well entitled to ridicule the person, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Sic fautor veterum, ut tabulas peccare vetantes,</q></l> +<l>Quæ bisquinque viri sanxerunt, <anchor id="corr045"/><corr sic="feodera">fœdera</corr> regum</l> +<l>Vel Gabiis, vel cum rigidis æquata Sabinis,</l> +<l>Pontificum libros, annosa volumina vatum,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Dictitet Albano Musas in monte loquutas:</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Yet he would have done well to have considered, if, amid the +manifold improvements of the Augustan poets, they had judged +right in rejecting those rich and sonorous diphthongs of the +<hi rend="italic">tabulæ peccare vetantes</hi>, which still sound with such strength +and majesty in the lines of Lucretius. +</p> + +<p> +There is scarcely a vestige of the Latin language remaining +during the two centuries which succeeded the enactment of +the twelve tables. At the end of that long period, and during +the first Punic war, a celebrated inscription, which is still +extant, recorded the naval victory obtained by the Consul +Duillius, in 492, over the Carthaginians. The column on +which it was engraved, and which became so famous by the + title of the <hi rend="italic">Columna Rostrata</hi>, was, as Livy<note place="foot">Lib. XLII. c. 20</note> informs us, struck +down by lightning during the interval between the second and +third Punic wars. It remained buried among the ruins of +Rome, till, at length, in 1565, its base, which contained the +<pb n="46"/><anchor id="Pg046"/>inscription, was dug up in the vicinity of the Capitol. So +much, however, was it defaced, that many of the letters were +illegible. These have been restored in the following manner +by the conjectures of the learned: +</p> + +<p> + <q>C. D<note place="foot">The letters which have been supplied are here printed in Italics.</note>. exemet leciones maximosque magistratus <hi rend="italic">no</hi>vem +castreis exfociunt. Macel<hi rend="italic">lam</hi> <hi rend="italic">pu</hi>cnandod cepet enque eodem +macis<hi rend="italic">tratu</hi> rem navebos marid consol primos <hi rend="italic">ceset</hi> clasesque +navales primos ornavit cumque eis navebos claseis pœnicas +om<hi rend="italic">nes</hi> sumas copias Cartaciniensis præesente <hi rend="italic">d</hi>ictatored olorum +in altod marid puc<hi rend="italic">nandod</hi> <hi rend="italic">vicit</hi> trigintaque na<hi rend="italic">veis</hi> <hi rend="italic">cepet</hi> cum +socieis septe<hi rend="italic">m</hi> triremosque naveis XX captum numei DCC. + captom æs navaled prædad poplom<note place="foot">Ciacconius, however, is of opinion that this is not precisely what was inscribed + on the base of the column in the time of Duillius, for that the inscription, having + been greatly effaced, was repaired, or rather engraved anew, after the time of Julius + Cæsar. <hi rend="italic">In Colum. Rost. Explic.</hi></note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +In modern Latin the above inscription would run +thus.—<q>Caius Duillius exemit: legiones, maximusque magistratus +novem castris effugiunt. Macellam pugnando cepit; inque +eodem magistratu, rem navibus mari Consul primus gessit, +classesque navales primus ornavit; cumque iis navibus classes +Punicas omnes summas copias Carthaginienses, præsente dictatore +illorum, in alto mari pugnando vicit: Trigintaque +naves cepit cum sociis septem, triremosque naves decem. +Captum nummi, captum æs navali præda, populo donavit.</q> +</p> + +<p> +There are also extant two inscriptions, which were engraved +on the tombstones of Lucius Scipio Barbatus and his son Lucius +Scipio, of which the former was somewhat prior, and <anchor id="corr046"/><corr sic="the the">the</corr> +latter a year subsequent to the date of the Duillian inscription. +The epitaph on Barbatus was discovered in 1780, in +the vault of the Scipian family, between the Via Appia and +Via Latina. Mr Hobhouse informs us that it is inscribed on a +handsome but plain sarcophagus, and he adds, <q>that the eloquent +simple inscription becomes the virtues and fellow-countrymen +of the deceased, and instructs us more than a +chapter of Livy in the style and language of the Republican +Romans</q><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Illustrations of Childe Harold</hi>, p. 169.</note>:— +</p> + +<p> +<q>Cornelius Lucius Scipio Barbatus <anchor id="corr046a"/><corr sic="Gnavoid ">Gnaivod</corr> patre prognatus +fortis vir sapiensque quoius forma virtutei parisuma fuit. +Consol Censor Aidilis quei fuit apud vos Taurasia Cisauna +Samnio cepit subicit omne Loucana opsidesque abdoucit.</q> +</p> + +<p> +The above may be converted into modern Latin, as follows: +</p> + +<p> +<q>C. L. Scipio Barbatus, Cneio patre prognatus, fortis vir +sapiensque, cujus forma virtuti par fuit. Consul, Censor, +<pb n="47"/><anchor id="Pg047"/>Ædilis qui fuit apud vos, Taurasiam, Cisaunam, Samnio cepit; +subjecit omnem Lucaniam obsidesque abducit.</q> The other +Scipian epitaph had been discovered long before the above, +on a slab which was found lying near the Porta Capena, having +been detached from the family vault. Though a good +many years later as to the date of its composition, the epitaph +on the son bears marks of higher antiquity than that on the +father:— +</p> + +<p> +<q>Honc oino ploirume consentiunt duonoro optumo fuise +viro Lucium Scipione. Filios Barbati Consol Censor Ædilis +hec fuit. Hec cepit Corsica Aleriaque urbe: dedit tempestatibus +aide mereto;</q> which means, <q>Hunc unum plurimi consentiunt +Romæ bonorum optimum fuisse virum Lucium Scipionem. +Filius Barbati, Consul, Censor, Ædilis his fuit. Hic +cepit Corsicam Aleriamque urbem: dedit tempestatibus ædem +merito</q>. +</p> + +<p> +The celebrated Eugubian tables were so called from having +been found at Eugubium (Gubbio) a city in ancient Umbria, +near the foot of the Apennines, where they were dug up +in 1444. When first discovered, they were believed to be in +the Egyptian language; but it was afterwards observed that +five of the seven tables were in the Etruscan character and language, +or rather in the Umbrian dialect of that tongue, and the +other two in Roman letters, though in a rustic jargon, between +Latin and <anchor id="corr047"/><corr sic="Estruscan">Etruscan</corr>, with such mixture of each, as might be +expected from an increased intercourse of the nations, and + the subjugation of the one by the other.<note place="foot">This sort of rustic Latin has by some writers been supposed to be the origin of + the modern Italian.</note> The two tables in +the Latin character were written towards the close of the sixth +century of Rome, and those in the Etruscan letters a short +while previous. So little, however, was the Etruscan language +fixed or understood, even in the middle of last century, when +the Etruscan rage was at its height in Italy, that Bonarota +believed that those tables contained treaties of the ancient +Italian nations—Gori, an Oscan poem, and Maffei, legal enactments, +till Passerius at length discovered that they consisted +solely of ordinances for the performance of sacred rites and + religious ceremonies.<note place="foot">Omnino ad jura pontificalia pertinere videntur. <hi rend="italic">In Dempsteri libros Paralipomena</hi>. + Ed. Luca, 1767. It was on these Eugubian tables that, in modern times, the + alphabet of the Etruscan language was first found. At the earliest attempt it was + very imperfect and contradictory; Maffei maintaining that these tables were in Hebrew, + and Gori that they were in Greek characters; but at length in 1732, M. Bourguet, + a Frenchman, by comparing the tables in the Roman with those in the Etruscan + character, found that the former was a compendium of the latter, and that many + words in the one corresponded with words in the other. Having got this key, he + was enabled, by comparing word with word, and letter with letter, to form an alphabet, + which, though not perfect, was much more complete than any previously produced, and was found to be the same with that of the Pelasgi, and not very different + from the alphabet communicated to the Greeks by Cadmus. <hi rend="italic">Dissertaz. dell Academia + Etrusca</hi>. T. I. p. 1. 1742.</note> +</p> + +<pb n="48"/><anchor id="Pg048"/> + +<p> +On comparing the fragments of the <hi rend="italic">Leges Regiæ</hi> with the +Duillian and Scipian inscriptions, it does not appear that the +Roman language, however greatly it may have varied, had +either improved or approached much nearer to modern Latin +in the fifth century than in the time of the kings. Short and +mutilated as these laws and inscriptions are, they still enable +us to draw many important conclusions with regard to the +general state of the language during the existence of the monarchy, +and the first ages of the republic. It has already been +mentioned that the <anchor id="corr048"/><corr sic="dipthong">diphthong</corr> <hi rend="italic">ai</hi> was employed where <hi rend="italic">ae</hi> came +to be afterwards substituted, as aide for æde; <hi rend="italic">ei</hi> instead of <hi rend="italic">i</hi>, +as castreis for castris; and <hi rend="italic">oi</hi> in place of <hi rend="italic">œ</hi>, as coilum for cœlum. +The vowel <hi rend="italic">e</hi> is often introduced instead of <hi rend="italic">o</hi>, as hemo +for homo, while, on the other hand, <hi rend="italic">o</hi> is sometimes used instead +of <hi rend="italic">e</hi>, as vostrum for vestrum; and Scipio Africanus is +said to have been the first who always wrote the <hi rend="italic">e</hi> in such + words<note place="foot">Quintilian, <hi rend="italic">Institut.</hi> Lib. I. c. 7.</note>. <hi rend="italic">U</hi> is frequently changed into <hi rend="italic">o</hi>, as honc for hunc, +sometimes into <hi rend="italic">ou</hi>, as abdoucit for abducit, and sometimes to +<hi rend="italic">oi</hi>, as oino for uno. On the whole, it appears that the vowels +were in a great measure used indiscriminately, and often, +especially in inscriptions, they were altogether omitted, as +bne for bene, though sometimes, again, an <hi rend="italic">e</hi> final was added, +as face for fac, dice for dic. As to the consonants,—<hi rend="italic">b</hi> at the +beginning of a word was <hi rend="italic">du</hi>, as duonorum for bonorum, and +it was <hi rend="italic">p</hi> at the middle or end, as opsides for obsides. The +letter <hi rend="italic">g</hi> certainly does not appear in those earliest specimens +of the Latin language—the hymn of the <hi rend="italic">Fratres Arvales</hi>, and +<hi rend="italic">Leges Regiæ</hi>, where <hi rend="italic">c</hi> is used in its place. Plutarch says, that +this letter was utterly unknown at Rome during the space of +five centuries, and was first introduced by the grammarian + Spurius Carvillius in the year 540<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Quæstiones Romanæ</hi>.</note>. It occurs, however, in +the epitaph of Scipio Barbatus, which was written at least +half a century before that date; and, what is remarkable, it is +there placed in a word where <hi rend="italic">c</hi> was previously and subsequently +employed, Gnaivo being written for Cnæo. The +Letter <hi rend="italic">r</hi> was not, as has been asserted, unknown to the ancient +Romans, but it was chiefly used in the beginning and end +of words—<hi rend="italic">s</hi> being employed instead of it in the middle, as + lases for lares. Frequently the letters <hi rend="italic">m</hi> and <hi rend="italic">s</hi> were omitted +at the end of words, especially, for the sake of euphony, when +the following word began with a consonant—thus we have +<pb n="49"/><anchor id="Pg049"/>Aleria cepit, for Aleriam cepit. The ancient Romans were +equally careful to avoid a hiatus of vowels, and hence they +wrote sin in place of si in. Double consonants were never + seen till the time of Ennius<note place="foot">Festus, voce <hi rend="italic">Solitaurilia</hi>.</note>; and we accordingly find in the +old inscriptions sumas for summas: <hi rend="italic">er</hi> was added to the infinitive +passive, as darier for dari, and <hi rend="italic">d</hi> was subjoined to words +ending with a vowel, as in altod, marid, pucnandod. It likewise +appears that the Romans were for a long period unacquainted +with the use of aspirates, and were destitute of the +<hi rend="italic">phi</hi> and <hi rend="italic">chi</hi> sounds of the Greek alphabet. Hence they wrote + triumpe for triumphe, and pulcer for pulcher<note place="foot">For a fuller detail of these variations see Funccius <hi rend="italic">de Pueritia Ling. Lat.</hi> c. 5. + Id. <hi rend="italic">de Adolescentia Ling. Lat.</hi> c. 7. and Terrasson, <hi rend="italic">Hist. de la Jurisprudence + Romaine</hi>. Part I. par. 8.</note>. We also meet +with a good many words, particularly substantives, which +afterwards became altogether obsolete, and some are applied +in a sense different from that in which they were subsequently +used. Finally, a difference in the conjugation of the same +verb, and a want of inflection in nouns, particularly proper +names of countries or cities, where the nominative frequently +occurs instead of the accusative, show the unsettled state of +the language at that early period<add><note place="foot"><anchor id="corr049"/>For a fuller detail of these variations see Funccius <hi rend="italic">de Pueritia Ling. Lat.</hi> c. 5. + Id. <hi rend="italic">de Adolescentia Ling. Lat.</hi> c. 7. and Terrasson, <hi rend="italic">Hist. de la Jurisprudence + Romaine</hi>. Part I. par. 8.</note></add>. +</p> + +<p> +It is unnecessary to prosecute farther the history of Roman +inscriptions, since, immediately after the erection of the Duillian +column in 494, Latin became a written literary language; +and although the diphthongs <hi rend="italic">ai</hi> and <hi rend="italic">ei</hi> were retained for more +than a century longer, most of the other archaisms were totally +rejected, and the language was so enriched by a more +copious admixture of the Greek, that, while always inferior to +that tongue, in ease, precision, perspicuity, and copiousness, +it came at length to rival it in dignity of enunciation, and in +that lofty accent which harmonized so well with the elevated +character of the people by whom it was uttered. +</p> + +<p> +This sudden improvement in language, as well as the +equally sudden revolution in taste and literature by which it +was accompanied, must be entirely and exclusively attributed +to the conquest of Magna Græcia, and the intercourse opened +to the Romans with the Greek colonies of Sicily. Their +minds were, no doubt, in some measure prepared, during the +five centuries which had followed the foundation of the city, +for receiving the seeds of learning. The very existence of +social life for so long a period must have in some degree +reclaimed them from their native barbarism. Freed from +hourly alarms excited by the attacks of foes whose territories +<pb n="50"/><anchor id="Pg050"/>reached almost to the gates of the city, it was now possible +for them to enjoy those pleasures which can only be relished +in tranquillity; but their genius, I believe, would have remained +unproductive and cold for half a millennium longer, +had it not been kindled by contact with a more polished and +animated nation, whose compositions could not be read without +enthusiasm, or imitated without advantage. +</p> + +<p> +However uncertain may be the story concerning the arrival +of Œnotrus in the south of Italy, the passage of the Pelasgi +from Epirus to the Po, seventeen generations before the Trojan +war, or the settlement of the Arcadian Evander in Latium, +there can be no doubt, that, about the commencement of the +Roman æra, the dissensions of the reigning families of Greece, +the commotions which pervaded its realms, the suggestions of +oracles, the uncertain tenure of landed property, the restless +spirit of adventure, and seasons of famine, all co-operated +in producing an emigration of numerous tribes, chiefly +Dorians and Achæans of Peloponnesus, who founded colonies +on the coasts of Asia, the Ægean islands, and Italy. In this +latter country, (which seems in all ages to have been the resort +and refuse of a redundant or unfortunate population,) +the Greek strangers first settled in a southern district, then +known by the ancient name of Iapygia, and since denominated +Calabria. Serenity of climate, joined to the vigour of laws, +simplicity of manners, and the energy peculiar to every rising +community, soon procured these colonies an enviable increase +of prosperity and power. They gradually drove the native +inhabitants to the interior of the country, and formed a political +state, which assumed the magnificent name of Magna +Græcia—an appellation which was by degrees applied to the +whole coast which bounds the bay of Tarentum. On that +shore, about half a century after the foundation of Rome, +arose the flourishing and philosophic town of Crotona, and the +voluptuous city of Sybaris. These were the consolidated +possessions of the Grecian colonies; but they had also scattered +seats all along the western coast of the territory which +now forms the kingdom of Naples. +</p> + +<p> +As in most other states, corruption of manners was the consequence +of prosperity and the cause of decay. Towards the +close of the third century of Rome, Pythagoras had in some +measure succeeded in reforming the morals of Crotona, while +the rival state of Sybaris, like the Moorish Grenada, hastened +to destruction, amid carousals and civil dissensions; and +though once capable, as is said, (but probably with some +exaggeration,) of bringing three hundred thousand soldiers +<pb n="51"/><anchor id="Pg051"/>into the field<note place="foot">This numeration, which rests on the authority of Diodorus Siculus, (Lib. XII.) + and Strabo, (Lib. VI.) has been a subject of considerable discussion and controversy + in modern times. (See Wallace on the numbers of Mankind, Hume’s Essay + on Populousness of Ancient Nations, and Gibbon’s Miscellaneous Works, vol. III. + p. 178.) In all MSS. of ancient authors, the numbers are corrupt and uncertain.</note>, it sunk, after a short struggle, under the power +of Crotona. The other independent states were successively +agitated by the violence of popular revolution, and crushed +by the severity of despotism. As in the mother country, they +had constant dissensions among themselves. This rivalship +induced them to call in the assistance of the Sicilians—a +measure which prepared the way for their subjection to the +vigorous but detestable sway of the elder Dionysius, and of +Agathocles. Tarentum, founded about the same time with +Sybaris and Crotona, was the most powerful city of the Grecian +colonies toward the conclusion of their political existence, +and the last formidable rival to the Romans in Italy. Like +the neighbouring states, it was chiefly ruined by the succour +of foreign allies. Unsuccessfully defended by Alexander Molossus, +oppressed by the Syracusan tyrants, and despoiled by +Cleomenes of Sparta, neither the genius of Pyrrhus, nor the +power of Carthage, could preserve it from the necessity of +final submission to the Romans. +</p> + +<p> +In all their varieties of fortune, the Grecian colonies had +maintained the manners and institutions of the mother country, +which no people ever entirely relinquish with the soil +they have left. A close political connection also subsisted +between them; and, about the year 300 of Rome, the Athenians +sent to the assistance of Sybaris a powerful expedition, +which, on the decay of that city, founded the town of +Thurium in the immediate vicinity. This constant intercourse +cherished and preserved the literary spirit of the colonies of +Magna Græcia. Herodotus, the father of history, and Lysias, +whose orations are the purest models of the simple Attic +eloquence, were, in early youth, among the original founders + of the colony of Thurium<note place="foot">Plutarch, <hi rend="italic">De Exilio</hi>. Id. <hi rend="italic">Vit. decem. Orator.</hi> Strabo, <hi rend="italic">Geog.</hi> Lib. XIV.</note>, and the latter held a share in its +government till an advanced period of life. The Eleatic +school of philosophy was founded in Magna Græcia; and the +impulse which the wisdom of Pythagoras had given to the +mind, promoted also the studies of literature. Plato visited +Tarentum during the consulship of Lucius Camillus and + Appius Claudius<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Cato Major, seu de Senectute</hi>, c. 12.</note>, which was in the 406th year of Rome, and +Zeuxis was invited from Greece to paint at Crotona the magnificent + temple of Juno, which had been erected in that city<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Rhetoricorum</hi>, Lib. II. c. 1.</note>. +<pb n="52"/><anchor id="Pg052"/>History and poetry were cultivated with a success which did +not dishonour the Grecian name. Lycus of Rhegium was +the civil, and Glaucus of the same city was the literary historian +of Magna Græcia. Orpheus of Crotona was the author +of a poem on the expedition of the Argonauts, attributed to +an elder Orpheus. The lyric productions of Ibicus of Rhegium +rivalled those of Anacreon and Alcæus. Two hundred +and fifty-five comedies, written by Alexis of Thurium, the titles +of which have been collected by Meursius, and a few fragments +of them by Stephens, are said to have been composed +in the happiest vein of the middle comedy of the Greeks, +which possessed much of the comic force of Aristophanes and +Cratinus, without their malignity. In his Meropis and Ancylio, +this dramatist is supposed to have carped at Plato; and +his comedy founded on the life of Pythagoras, was probably +in a similar vein of satire. Stephano, the son of Alexis, and +who, according to Suidas, was the uncle of Menander, became +chiefly celebrated for his tragedies; but his comedies were +also distinguished by happy pictures of life, and uncommon +harmony of versification. +</p> + +<p> +War, which had so long retarded the progress of literature +at Rome, at length became the cause of its culture. The +Romans were now involved in a contest with the civilized +colonies of Magna Græcia. Accordingly, when they garrisoned +Thurium, in order to defend it against the Samnites, +and when in 482 they obtained complete possession of Magna +Græcia, by the capture of Tarentum, which presented the last +resistance to their arms, they could not fail to catch a portion +of Grecian taste and spirit, or at least to admire the beautiful +creations of Grecian fancy. Many of the conquerors remained +in Magna Græcia, while, on the other hand, all the inhabitants +of its cities, who were most distinguished for literary attainments, +fixed their residence at Rome. +</p> + +<p> +The first Carthaginian war, which broke out in 489, so far +from retarding the literary influence of these strangers, accelerated +the steps of improvement. Unlike the former contests +of the Romans, which were either with neighbouring states, +or with barbarous nations who came to attack them in their +own territories, it was not attended with that immediate danger +which is utterly inconsistent with literary leisure. In its prosecution, +too, the Romans for the first time carried their arms +beyond Italy. Literature, indeed, was not one of those novelties +in which the western part of Africa was fruitful, but, with +the exception of Greece itself, there was no country where it +flourished more luxuriantly than in Sicily; and that island, as +is well known, was the principal scene of the first great strug<pb n="53"/><anchor id="Pg053"/>gle between Rome and Carthage. None of the Grecian colonies +shone with such splendour as Syracuse, a city founded +by the Dorians of Corinth, in the 19th year of Rome. This +capital had attained the summit both of political and literary +renown long before the first Carthaginian war. Æschylus +passed the concluding years of his life in Sicily, and wrote, it +is said, his tragedy of <hi rend="italic">The Persians</hi>, to gratify the curiosity of +Hiero I. King of Syracuse, who was desirous to see a representation +of the celebrated war which the Greeks had waged +against Xerxes. Epicharmus, retained in the same elegant +court, was the first who rejected, on the stage, the ancient +mummeries of the satires, and composed dramas on that regular +elaborate plan, which was reckoned worthy of imitation by +Plautus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 1"><q rend="post: none">Dicitur ————————————</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Plautus ad exemplar Siculi properare Epicharmi<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. ep. 1. v. 58.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Dionysius, the tyrant, was also a patron of learning, and was +himself a competitor in the fields of literature. Philistus, the +historian, was the friend of the elder, and Plato of the younger +Dionysius. Aristippus and Æschines passed some time in the +court of these tyrants. Theocritus, and other poets of the +Alexandrian constellation, resided in Sicily before they partook +in Egypt of the splendid patronage of the Ptolemies. +The Syracusans, who put to death so many of their Athenian +prisoners in cold blood, and with frightful tortures, spared +those of them who could recite the verses of Euripides. Scenic +representations were peculiarly popular in Sicily: Its +towns were crowded with theatres, and its dramatists were +loaded with honours. The theatrical exhibitions which the +Roman invaders of Sicily must have witnessed, and the respect +there paid to distinguished poets, would naturally awaken literary +emulation. During a contest of nearly twenty-four years +between Rome and Carthage, Hiero II., King of Syracuse, +was the zealous and strenuous ally of the Romans. At the +conclusion of peace between these rival nations, in the year +512, part of Sicily was ceded to the Romans, and the intercourse +which consequently arose with the inhabitants of this +newly-acquired territory, laid the foundation of those studies, +which were afterwards brought to perfection by the progress + of time, and by direct communication with Greece itself<note place="foot">See Micali, <hi rend="italic">Italia avant. il Domin. dei Romani</hi>. Raoul-Rochette, <hi rend="italic">Hist. de + l’Etablissement des Colonies Grecques</hi>. Heyne, <hi rend="italic">Opusc. Academ.</hi> Nogarolæ, + <hi rend="italic">Epist. de Italis qui Græce scripserunt</hi>. ap. Fabricius, <hi rend="italic">Supplem. ad Vossium De + Histor. Lat.</hi></note>. +</p> + +<pb n="54"/><anchor id="Pg054"/> + +<p> +Accordingly, it is in the end of the fifth, and beginning of +the sixth century, from the building of Rome, that we find +among its inhabitants the earliest vestiges of literature. Poetry, +as with most other nations, was the first of the liberal arts +which was cultivated among the Romans; and dramatic poetry, +founded on the school of Greece, appears to have been that +which was earliest preferred. We have seen, indeed, that +previous to this period, and in the year 392, when the city +was afflicted with a plague, the Senate decreed that players +should be summoned from Etruria to appease the wrath of the +gods by scenic representations, and that the Roman youth +imitated these expiatory performances, by rallying each other +in extemporary verses. This by some has been considered as +a dawning of the drama, since the characters probably bore a +resemblance to the Arlequin and Scaramouch of the Italian +farces. But +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Livius Andronicus"/><index index="pdf" level1="Livius Andronicus"/> +<head>LIVIUS ANDRONICUS,</head> + +<p> +A native of Magna Græcia, was the first who attempted to +establish at Rome a regular theatre, or to connect a dramatic +fable, free from the mummeries, the <hi rend="italic">ballet</hi>, and the melodrama + of the ancient satires<note place="foot">Ausus est primus argumento fabulam serere. Livy, Lib. VII. c. 2.</note>. Tiraboschi asserts, that when +his country was finally subdued by the Romans, in 482, Livius + was made captive and brought to Rome<note place="foot">Tiraboschi, <hi rend="italic">Stor. + <anchor id="corr054"/><corr sic="dell">dell.</corr> + Letteratura Italiana</hi>. Parte III. Lib. II. c. 1.</note>. It is generally believed +that he there became the slave, and afterwards the +freedman of Livius Salinator, from whom he derived one of +his names: these facts, however, do not seem to rest on any + authority more ancient than the Eusebian Chronicle<note place="foot">Hieronym. in <hi rend="italic">Euseb. Chron.</hi> p. 37. In Scaliger, <hi rend="italic">Thesaurus Temporum</hi>, ed. + Amstel. 1658.</note>. The +precise period of his death is uncertain; but in Cicero’s Dialogue +<hi rend="italic">De Senectute</hi>, Cato is introduced saying, that he had + seen old Livius while he was himself a youth<note place="foot">Vidi etiam senem Livium, qui usque ad adolescentiam meam processit ætate. + <hi rend="italic">De Senectute</hi>, c. 14.</note>. Now Cato +was born in 519, and since the period of youth among the +Romans was considered as commencing at fifteen, it may be +presumed that the existence of Livius was at least protracted +till the year 534 of the city. It has been frequently said, that + he lived till the year 546<note place="foot">Signorelli, <hi rend="italic">Storia de Teatri</hi>, Tom. II.</note>, because Livy<note place="foot">Lib. XXVII. c. 37.</note> mentions that a +hymn composed by this ancient poet was publicly sung in that +<pb n="55"/><anchor id="Pg055"/>year, to avert the disasters threatened by an alarming prodigy; +but the historian does not declare that it was written for the +occasion, or even recently before. +</p> + +<p> +The earliest play of Livius was represented in 513 or 514, +about a year after the termination of the first Punic war. Osannus, +a modern German author, has written a learned and chronological +dissertation on the question, in which of these years + the first Roman play was performed<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Analecta Critica poesis Romanorum Scænicæ Reliquias lllustrantia</hi>, c. 3. + ed. Berlin, 1816.</note>; but it is extremely difficult +for us to come to any satisfactory conclusion on a subject +which, even in the time of Cicero, was one of doubt and + controversy<note place="foot">Est enim inter scriptores de numero annorum controversia. <anchor id="corr055"/><corr sic="(italics removed)">Cicero</corr>, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, + c. 18. Cicero, however, fixes on the year 514, following, as he says, the account + of his friend Atticus.</note>. Like Thespis, and other dramatists in the commencement +of the theatrical art, Livius was an actor, and for +a considerable time the sole performer in his own pieces. +Afterwards, however, his voice failing, in consequence of the +audience insisting on a repetition of favourite passages, he introduced +a boy who relieved him, by declaiming in concert +with the flute, while he himself executed the corresponding +gesticulations in the monologues, and in the parts where high +exertion was required, employing his own voice only in the + conversational and less elevated scenes<note place="foot">Livy, Lib. VII. c. 2. Quum sæpius revocatus vocem obtudisset, veniâ petitâ, + puerum ad canendum ante tibicinem quum statuisset, canticum egisse, aliquanto + magis vigente motu, quia nihil vocis usus impediebat.</note>. It was observed +that his action grew more lively and animated, because he +exerted his whole strength in gesticulating, while another had +the care and trouble of pronouncing. <q>Hence,</q> continues +Livy, <q>the practice arose of reciting those passages which +required much modulation of the voice, to the gesture and +action of the comedian. Thenceforth the custom so far prevailed, +that the comedians never pronounced anything except + the verses of the dialogues<note place="foot">Inde ad manum cantari histrionibus <anchor id="corr055a"/><corr sic="coeptum">cœptum</corr>, diverbiaque tantum ipsorum voci + relicta.—<hi rend="italic">Ibid.</hi></note>:</q> And this system, which one +should think must have completely destroyed the theatric illusion, +continued, under certain modifications, to subsist on the +Roman stage during the most refined periods of taste and literature. +</p> + +<p> +The popularity of Livius increasing from these performances, +as well as from a propitiatory hymn he had composed, +and which had been followed by great public success, a +building was assigned to him on the Aventine hill. This +edifice was partly converted into a theatre, and was also in<pb n="56"/><anchor id="Pg056"/>habited by a troop of players, for whom Livius wrote his + pieces, and frequently acted along with them<note place="foot">Festus, voce <hi rend="italic">Scribas</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +It has been disputed whether the first drama represented + by Livius Andronicus at Rome was a tragedy or comedy<note place="foot">Osannus, <hi rend="italic">Analecta Critica</hi>, c. 3.</note>. +However this may be, it appears from the names which have +been preserved of his plays, that he wrote both tragedies and +comedies. These titles, which have been collected by Fabricius +and other writers, are, <hi rend="italic">Achilles</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Adonis</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Ægisthus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Ajax</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Andromeda</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Antiopa</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Centauri</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Equus Trojanus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Helena</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Hermione</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Ino</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Lydius</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Protesilaodamia</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Serenus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Tereus</hi>, + <hi rend="italic">Teucer</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Virgo</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Bibliotheca Latina</hi>, Tom. III. Lib. IV. c. 1.</note>. Such names also evince that most of his +dramas were translated or imitated from the works of his +countrymen of Magna Græcia, or from the great tragedians +of Greece. Thus, Æschylus wrote a tragedy on the subject +of Ægisthus: There is still an Ajax of Sophocles extant, and +he is known to have written an Andromeda: Stobæus mentions +the Antiopa of Euripides: Four Greek dramatists, Sophocles, +Euripides, Anaxandrides, and Philæterus, composed +tragedies on the subject of Tereus; and Epicharmus, as well +as others, chose for their comedies the story of the Syrens. +</p> + +<p> +Little, however, except the titles, remains to us, from the +dramas of Livius. The longest passage we possess in connection, +extends only to four lines. It forms part of a hymn +to Diana, recited by the chorus, in the tragedy of <hi rend="italic">Ino</hi>, and +contains an animated exhortation to a person about to proceed +to the chase:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Et jam purpureo suras include cothurno,</q></l> +<l>Baltheus et revocet volucres in pectore sinus;</l> +<l>Pressaque jam gravida crepitent tibi terga pharetra:</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Dirige odorisequos ad cæca cubilia canes<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Let the red buskin now your limbs invest,</q></l> + <l>And the loose robe be belted to your breast;</l> + <l>The rattling quiver let your shoulders bear—</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Throw off the hounds which scent the secret lair.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This passage testifies the vast improvement effected by Livius +on the Latin Tongue; and indeed the polish of the language +and metrical correctness of these hexameter lines, have of +late led to a suspicion that they are not the production of a + period so ancient as the age of Livius<note place="foot">Jos. Scaliger, <hi rend="italic">Lectionibus Ausonianis</hi>, where the lines are attributed to Lævius. + ap. Sagitarius, <hi rend="italic">de Vita L. Andronici</hi>, c. 8. Osannus, <hi rend="italic">Analecta Critica</hi>, c. 2. p. 36. + Some verses in the <hi rend="italic">Carmen de Arte Metrica</hi> of Terentianus Maurus, are the chief + authority for these hexameters being by Livius:— + + <lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Livius ille vetus Grajo cognomine, suæ</q></l> + <l>Inserit Inonis versu, puto, tale docimen,</l> + <l>Præmisso heroo subjungit namque <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">μειουρον</foreign><!--[Greek: meiouron]-->,</l> + <l>Hymno quando Chorus festo canit ore Triviæ—</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none"><q>Et jam purpureo,</q></q> &c.</l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>, or at least that they +<pb n="57"/><anchor id="Pg057"/>have been modernised by some later hand. With this earliest +offspring of the Latin muse, it may be curious to compare a +production from her last age of decrepitude. Nemesianus, in +his <hi rend="italic">Cynegeticon</hi>, has closely imitated this passage while exhorting +Diana to prepare for the chase: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Sume habitus, arcumque manu; pictamque pharetram</q></l> +<l>Suspende ex humeris; sint aurea tela, sagittæ;</l> +<l>Candida puniceis aptentur crura cothurnis:</l> +<l>Sit chlamys aurato multum subtemine lusa,</l> +<l>Corrugesque sinus gemmatis baltheus artet</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nexibus ——</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +As the above-quoted verses in the chorus of the <hi rend="italic">Ino</hi> are the +only passage among the fragments of Livius, from which a +connected meaning can be elicited, we must take our opinion +of his poetical merits from those who judged of them while +his writings <anchor id="corr057"/><corr sic="where">were</corr> yet wholly extant. Cicero has pronounced +an unfavourable decision, declaring that they scarcely deserved + a second perusal<note place="foot">Livianæ fabulæ non satis dignæ quæ iterum legantur. <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 18.</note>. They long, however, continued popular +in Rome, and were read by the youths in schools even during +the Augustan age of poetry. It is evident, indeed, that during +that golden period of Roman literature, there prevailed a taste +corresponding to our black-letter rage, which led to an inordinate +admiration of the works of Livius, and to the bitter +complaints of Horace, that they should be extolled as perfect, +or held up by old pedants to the imitation of youth in an age +when so much better models existed: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Non equidem insector, delendaque carmina Livi</q></l> +<l>Esse reor, memini quæ plagosum mihi parvo</l> +<l>Orbilium dictare; sed emendata videri,</l> +<l>Pulchraque, et exactis minimum distantia, miror:</l> +<l>Inter quæ verbum emicuit si forte decorum, et</l> +<l>Si versus paulo concinnior unus et alter;</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Injuste totum ducit venditque poema<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. Ep. 1. v. 69.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But although Livius may have been too much read in the +schools, and too much admired in an age, which could boast +of models so greatly superior to his writings, he is at least +entitled to praise, as the inventor among the Romans of a +species of poetry which was afterwards carried by them to +much higher perfection. By translating the Odyssey, too, into +Latin verse, he adopted the means which, of all others, was +most likely to foster and improve the infant literature of his +country—as he thus presented it with an image of the most +<pb n="58"/><anchor id="Pg058"/>pure and perfect taste, and at the same time with those wild +and romantic adventures, which are best suited to attract the +sympathy and interest of a half-civilized nation. This happy +influence could not be prevented even by the use of the rugged +Saturnian verse, which led Cicero to compare the translation +of Livius to the ancient statues, which might be attributed + to Dædalus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 18.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The Latin Odyssey commenced— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Virum mihi, Camena, insece versutum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There have also been three lines preserved by Festus, which +are translated from the 8th Book, expressing the effects produced +on the mind by a sea-storm— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Namque nilum pejus</q></l> +<l>Macerat hemonem quamde mare sævom: vires quoi</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Sunt magnæ, topper confringent importunæ undæ<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Nought worse can be</q></l> + <l>For wearing out a man than the rough sea;</l> + <l>Even though his force be great, and heart be brave,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">All will be broken by the vexing wave.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +From the æra in which the dramatic productions of Livius +appeared, theatrical representations formed the object of a +peculiar art. The more regular drama, founded on that of +Magna Græcia, or Sicily, being divided into tragedy and comedy, +became, in a great measure, the province of professional +players or authors, while the Roman youths of distinction continued +to amuse themselves with the <hi rend="italic">Fabulæ Atellanæ</hi>, and +<hi rend="italic">Exodia</hi>, a species of satirical medley, derived from the ancient +Etruscans, or from the Osci, the nature and progress of which +I shall hereafter have occasion more particularly to examine. +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Cneius Nævius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Cneius Naevius"/> +<head>CNEIUS NÆVIUS,</head> + +<p> +A native of Campania, was the first imitator of the regular +dramatic works which had been produced by Livius Andronicus. +He served in the first Punic war, and his earliest plays + were represented at Rome in the year 519<note place="foot">Au. Gellius, Lib. XVII. c. 21. Ed. Lugd. Bat. 1666.</note>. The names of +his tragedies, from which as few fragments remain as from +those of Livius, are still preserved:—<hi rend="italic">Alcestis</hi>, (from which +there is yet extant a description of old age in rugged and barbarous +verse)—<hi rend="italic">Danae</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Hesiona</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Hector</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Lycurgus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Phœnissæ</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Protesilaus</hi>, and <hi rend="italic">Telephus</hi>. All +<pb n="59"/><anchor id="Pg059"/>these were translated, or closely imitated from the works of +Euripides, Anaxandrides, and other Greek dramatists. Cicero +commends a passage in the <hi rend="italic">Hector</hi>, one of the above-mentioned + tragedies<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tuscul. Disput.</hi> Lib. IV. c. 31.</note>, where the hero of the piece, delighted with +the praises which he had received from his father Priam, exclaims— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="post: none">—— Lætus sum</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Laudari me abs te, pater, laudato viro<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l rend="margin-left: 6"><q rend="post: none">—— My spirits, sire, are raised,</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Thus to be praised by one the world has praised.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Nævius, however, was accounted a better comic than tragic +poet. Cicero has given us some specimens of his jests, with +which that celebrated wit and orator appears to have been +greatly amused; but they consist rather in unexpected turns +of expression, or a play of words, than in genuine humour. +One of these, recorded in the second Book <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, has +found its way into our jest-books; and though one of the best +in Cicero, it is one of the worst of Joe Miller. It is the saying +of a knavish servant, <q>that nothing was shut up from him +in his master’s house</q>.—<q>Solum esse, cui domi nihil sit nec +obsignatum, nec occlusum: Quod idem,</q> adds Cicero, <q>in +bono servo dici solet, sed hoc iisdem etiam verbis.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Unfortunately for Nævius, he did not always confine himself +in his comedies to such inoffensive jests. The dramas of +Magna Græcia and Sicily, especially those of Epicharmus, +were the prototypes of the older Greek comedy; and accordingly +the most ancient Latin plays, particularly those of +Nævius, which were formed on the same school, though there +be no evidence that they ridiculed political events, partook of +the personal satire and invective which pervaded the productions +of Aristophanes. If, as is related, the comedies of +Nævius were directed against the vices and corporal defects +of the Consuls and Senators of Rome, he must have been the +most original of the Latin comic poets, and infinitely more so +than Plautus or Terence; since although he may have parodied +or copied the dramatic fables of the ancient Greek or Sicilian +comedies, the spirit and colouring of the particular scenes +must have been his own. The elder Scipio was one of the +chief objects of his satiric representations, and the poetic +severity with which Aristophanes persecuted Socrates or Euripides, +was hardly more indecent and misdirected than the +sarcasms of Nævius against the greatest captain, the most +accomplished scholar, and the most virtuous citizen of his age. +<pb n="60"/><anchor id="Pg060"/>Some lines are still extant, in which he lampooned Scipio on +account of a youthful amour, in which he had been detected +by his father— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Etiam qui res magnas manu sæpe gessit gloriose,</q></l> +<l>Cujus facta viva nunc vigent, qui apud gentes solus</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Præstat, eum suus pater, cum pallio uno, ab amicâ abduxit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The conqueror of Hannibal treated these libels with the +same indifference with which Cæsar afterwards regarded the +lines of Catullus. Nævius, however, did not long escape with +impunity. Rome was a very different sort of republic from +Athens: It was rather an aristocracy than a democracy, and +its patricians were not always disposed to tolerate the taunts +and insults which the chiefs of the Greek <anchor id="corr060"/><corr sic="democrary">democracy</corr> were +obliged to endure. Nævius had said in one of his verses, that +the patrician family of the Metelli had frequently obtained the +Consulship before the age permitted by law, and he insinuated +that they had been promoted to this dignity, not in consequence +of their virtues, but the cruelty of the Roman fate: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Fato Metelli Romæ fiunt Consules.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +With the assistance of the other patricians, the Metelli retorted +his sarcasms in a Saturnian stanza, not unlike the +measure of some of our old ballads, in which they threatened +to play the devil with their witty persecutor— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Et Nævio Poetæ,</q></l> +<l>Cum sæpe læderentur,</l> +<l>Dabunt malum Metelli,</l> +<l>Dabunt malum Metelli,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Dabunt malum Metelli.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The Metelli, however, did not confine their vengeance to this +ingenious and spirited satire, in the composition of which, it +may be presumed that the whole Roman Senate was engaged. +On account of the unceasing abuse and reproaches which he +had uttered against them, and other chief men of the city, he +was thrown into prison, where he wrote his comedies, the +<hi rend="italic">Hariolus</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Leontes</hi>. These plays being in some measure +intended as a recantation of his former invectives, he was + liberated by the tribunes of the people.<note place="foot">Au. Gellius. Lib. III. c. 3. Vossius. <hi rend="italic">De Historicis Latinis</hi>, Lib. I. c. 2.</note> He soon, however, +relapsed into his former courses, and continued to persecute +the nobility in his dramas and satires with such implacable + dislike, that he was at length driven from Rome by their in<pb n="61"/><anchor id="Pg061"/>fluence, and having retired to Utica<note place="foot">Hieronym. <hi rend="italic">Chronicum Eusebianum</hi>, p. 37, ut supra.</note>, he died there, in the + year 550, according to Cicero<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 15.</note>; but Varro fixes his death +somewhat later. Before leaving Rome, he had composed the +following epitaph on himself, which Gellius remarks is full of +Campanian arrogance; though the import of it, he adds, might + be allowed to be true, had it been written by another<note place="foot">Au. Gellius, Lib. I. c. 24.</note>; +</p> + +<lg id="qvp061"> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Mortales immortales flere si foret fas,</q></l> +<l>Flerent divæ Camœnæ Nævium poetam;</l> +<l>Itaque postquam est Orcino traditus thesauro,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Oblitei sunt Romæ loquier Latina lingua<note place="foot"><lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">If blest immortals mortals might bemoan,</q></l> + <l>Each heavenly Muse would Nævius’ loss deplore:</l> + <l>Soon as his spirit to the shades had flown,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">In Rome the Roman tongue was heard no more.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Besides his comedies and the above epitaph, Nævius was +also author of the Cyprian Iliad, a translation from a Greek +poem, called the <anchor id="corr061"/><corr sic="Cyrian Epic"><hi rend="italic">Cyprian Epic</hi></corr>. Aristotle, in the 23d chapter +of his Poetics, mentions the original work, (<foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">τα κυπρια</foreign><!--[Greek: ta kypria]-->,) which, +he says, had furnished many subjects for the drama. Some +writers, particularly Pindar, have attributed this Greek poem +to Homer; and there was long an idle story current, that he +had given it as a portion to his daughter Arsephone. Herodotus, +in his second Book, concludes, after some critical discussion, +that it was not written by Homer, but that it was +doubtless the work of a contemporary poet, or one who lived +shortly after him. Heyne thinks it most probable, that it was +by a poet called Stasinus, a native of the island of Cyprus, + and that it received its name from the country of its author<note place="foot">Heyne, <hi rend="italic">Excurs.</hi> 1. ad Lib. II. <hi rend="italic">Æneid.</hi></note>. +Whoever may have written this Cyprian Epic, it contained +twelve books, and was probably a work of amorous and +romantic fiction. It commenced with the nuptials of Thetis +and Peleus—it related the contention of the three goddesses +on Mount Ida—the fables concerning Palamedes—the story of +the daughters of Anius—and the love adventures of the Phrygian +fair during the early period of the siege of Troy—and it +terminated with the council of the gods, at which it was resolved +that Achilles should be withdrawn from the war, by + sowing dissension between him and Atrides<note place="foot">Id. ad Æneid. The Cyprian Iliad had long been almost universally ascribed + to Nævius, and lines were quoted from it as his by all the old grammarians. Several + modern German critics, however, think that it was the work of Lævius, a poet + who lived some time after Nævius, since the lines preserved from the Cyprian Iliad + are hexameters,—a measure not elsewhere used by Nævius, nor introduced into + Italy, according to their supposition, before the time of Ennius. Osannus, <hi rend="italic">Analecta + Critica</hi>, p. 36. Herman, <hi rend="italic">Elementa Doctrinæ Metricæ</hi>, p. 210. Ed. Glasg. + 1817.</note>. +</p> + +<pb n="62"/><anchor id="Pg062"/> + +<p> +A metrical chronicle, which chiefly related the events of +the first Punic war, was another, and probably the last work +of Nævius, since Cicero says, that in writing it he filled up +the leisure of his latter days with wonderful complacency and + satisfaction<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Senectute</hi>. c. 14.</note>. It was originally undivided; but, after his + death, was separated into seven books<note place="foot">Suetonius, <hi rend="italic">De Illust. Grammat.</hi></note>.—Although the first +Punic war was the principal subject, as appears from its announcement, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Qui terräi Latiäi hemones tuserunt</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vires fraudesque Poinicas fabor;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +yet it also afforded a rapid sketch of the preceding incidents +of Roman history. It commenced with the flight of Æneas + from Carthage, in a ship built by Mercury<note place="foot">Servius, <hi rend="italic">Ad Æneid.</hi> Lib. 1.</note>; and the early +wars of the Romans were detailed in the first and second +books. To judge by the fragments which remain, the whole +work appears to have been full of mythological machinery. +Macrobius informs us, that some lines of this production +described the Romans tost by a tempest, and represented +Venus complaining of the hardships which they suffered to +Jupiter, who consoles her by a prospect of their future glory—a +passage which probably suggested those verses in the first +book of the Æneid, where Venus, in like manner, complains +to Jupiter of the danger experienced by her son in a storm, + and the god consoles her by assurances of his ultimate prosperity<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi>, Lib. VI. c. 2. Ed. Lugduni, 1560. I am anxious to take this opportunity + of remarking, that the books and chapters of the <hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi> of Macrobius + are differently divided in different editions. The same observation applies to many + of the books most frequently referred to in the course of this work, as Pliny’s Natural + History, Aulus Gellius, and Cicero. This difference in the division of chapters, + I fear, has led to a suspicion with regard to the accuracy of a few of my + references, which, however, have been uniformly verified on some edition or other, + though I cannot pretend that I have always had access to the best.</note>. +Cicero mentions, that Ennius, too, though he classes +Nævius among the fauns and rustic bards, had borrowed, or, +if he refused to acknowledge his obligations, had pilfered, + many ornaments from his predecessor<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 19.</note>. In the same passage, +Cicero, while he admits that Ennius was the more elegant and +correct writer, bears testimony to the merit of the older bard, +and declares, that the Punic war of this antiquated poet afforded +him a pleasure as exquisite as the finest statue that was +ever formed by Myron. To judge, however, from the lines +which remain, though in general too much broken to enable +us even to divine their meaning, the style of Nævius in this +<pb n="63"/><anchor id="Pg063"/>work was more rugged and remote from modern Latin than +that of his own plays and satires, or the dramas of Livius +Andronicus. +</p> + +<p> +The whole, too, is written in the rough, unmodulated, Saturnian +verse—a sort of irregular iambics, said to have been +originally employed by Faunus and the prophets, who delivered +their oracles in this measure. To such rude and unpolished +verses Ennius alludes in a fragment of his Annals, +while explaining his reasons for not treating of the first Punic +war— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Scripsere alii rem</q></l> +<l>Versibus, quos olim Fauni, vatesque canebant;</l> +<l>Cum neque Musarum scopulos quisquam superarat,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nec dicti studiosus erat.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +As this was the most ancient species of measure employed +in Roman poetry, as it was universally used before the melody +of Greek verse was poured on the Roman ear, and as, from +ancient practice, the same strain continued to be repeated till +the age of Ennius, by whom the heroic measure was introduced, +it would not be suitable to omit some notice of its +origin and structure in an account of Roman literature and +poetry. +</p> + +<p> +Several writers have supposed that the Saturnian measure + was borrowed by the Romans from the Greeks<note place="foot">Fortunatianus. Edit. Putsch. p. 2679. Bentley, <hi rend="italic">Dissert. on Phalaris</hi>, p. + 162. Hawkins, <hi rend="italic">Inquiry into the Nature of Latin Poetry</hi>, p. 452. Ed. Lond. 1817.</note>, having been +used by Euripides, and particularly by Archilochus; but +others have believed that it was an invention of the ancient + Italians<note place="foot">Merula, Ed. Ennii Fragm. p. 88. Herman, <hi rend="italic">Elementa Doct. Met.</hi> p. 395.</note>. It was first employed in the Carmen Saliare, songs +of triumph, supplications to the gods, or monumental inscriptions, +and was afterwards, as we have seen, adopted in the +works of Livius Andronicus and Nævius. In consequence of +the fragments which remain of the Saturnian verses being so +short and corrupted, it is extremely difficult to fix their regular +measure, or reduce them to one standard of versification. +Herman seems to consider a Saturnian line as having +regularly consisted of two iambuses, an amphibrachys, and +three trochaës— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>˘ _ | ˘ _ | ˘ _ ˘ | _ ˘ | _ ˘ | _ ˘</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +A dactyl, however, was occasionally admitted into the place +of the first or second trochaë, and a spondee was not unfrequently +introduced indiscriminately. It also appears that a +<pb n="64"/><anchor id="Pg064"/>Saturnian line was sometimes divided into two—the first line +consisting of the two iambuses and amphibrachys, and the +second of the trochaës, whence the Saturnian verse has been +sometimes called iambic, and at others trochaic. +</p> + +<p> +The Hexameter verse, which had been invented by the +Greeks, was first introduced into Latium, or at least, was first +employed in a work of any extent, by +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Ennius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Ennius"/> +<head>ENNIUS,</head> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Qui primus amœno</q></l> +<l>Detulit ex Helicone perenni fronde coronam,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Per gentes Italas hominum quæ clara clueret.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This poet, who has generally received the glorious appellation +of the Father of Roman Song, was a native of Rudiæ, a town + in Calabria, and lived from the year of Rome 515 to 585<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 18. Id. <hi rend="italic">De Senect.</hi> c. 5.</note>. In +his early youth he went to Sardinia; and, if Silius Italicus +may be believed, he served in the Calabrian levies, which, in +the year 538, followed Titus Manlius to the war which he +waged in that island against the favourers of the Carthaginian + cause<note place="foot">Sil. Ital. Lib. XII.</note>. After the termination of the campaign, he continued + to live for twelve years in Sardinia<note place="foot">Aurelius Victor says he taught Cato Greek in Sardinia, (In præturâ Sardiniam + subegit, ubi ab Ennio Græcis literis institutus;) but this is inconsistent with what + is related by Cicero, that Cato did not acquire Greek till old age. (<hi rend="italic">De Senectute</hi>, + c. 8.)</note>. He was at length +brought to Rome by Cato, the Censor, who, in 550, visited + Sardinia, on returning as <anchor id="corr064"/><corr sic="questor">quæstor</corr> from Africa<note place="foot">Cornelius Nepos, <hi rend="italic">In Vita Catonis</hi>.</note>. At Rome he +fixed his residence on the Aventine hill, where he lived in a +very frugal manner, having only a single servant maid as an + attendant<note place="foot">Hieron. <hi rend="italic">Chron. Euseb.</hi> p. 37.</note>. He instructed, however, the Patrician youth in +Greek, and acquired the friendship of many of the most illustrious +men in the state. Being distinguished (like Æschylus, the +great father of Grecian tragedy) in arms as well as letters, he +followed M. Fulvius Nobilior during his expedition to Ætolia + in 564<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Pro Archia</hi>, c. 10. <hi rend="italic">Tusc. Disput.</hi> Lib. I. c. 2.</note>; and in 569 he obtained the freedom of the city, +through the favour of Quintus Fulvius Nobilior, the son of his + former patron, Marcus<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 20.</note>. He was also protected by the elder +Scipio Africanus, whom he is said to have accompanied in all +his campaigns: +</p> + +<pb n="65"/><anchor id="Pg065"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Hærebat doctus lateri, castrisque solebat</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Omnibus in medias Ennius ire tubas<note place="foot">Claudian, <hi rend="italic">de Laud. Stilichonis</hi>, Lib. III. Præf.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is difficult, however, to see in what expeditions he could +have attended this renowned general. His Spanish and African +wars were concluded before Ennius was brought from Sardinia +to Rome; and the campaign against Antiochus was commenced +and terminated while he was serving under Fulvius + Nobilior in Ætolia<note place="foot"><anchor id="corr065"/><corr sic="Muller">Müller</corr> thinks it was in Sardinia he served under Africanus. <hi rend="italic">Einleitung zu + Kentniss Lateinischen Schriftsteller</hi>, Tom. I. p. 378. Ed. Dresden, 1747–51.</note>. In his old age he obtained the friendship +of Scipio Nasica; and the degree of intimacy subsisting +between them has been characterised by the well-known anecdote + of their successively feigning to be from home<note place="foot"> Cicero, <hi rend="italic">De Orat.</hi> Lib. II. c. 68.</note>. He is + said to have been intemperate in drinking<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. I. Ep. 19. v. 7.</note>, which brought +on the disease called <hi rend="italic">Morbus Articularis</hi>, a disorder resembling +the gout, of which he died at the age of seventy, just +after he had exhibited his tragedy of Thyestes: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ennius ipse pater dum pocula siccat iniqua,</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Hoc vitio tales <anchor id="corr065a"/><corr sic="furtur">fertur</corr> meruisse dolores<note place="foot">Ser. Sammonicus, <hi rend="italic">de Medicina</hi>, c. 37.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The evils, however, of old age and indigence were supported +by him, as we learn from Cicero, with such patience, and even +cheerfulness, that one would almost have imagined he derived +satisfaction from circumstances which are usually regarded, + as being, of all others, the most dispiriting and oppressive<note place="foot"> Annos septuaginta natus, ita ferebat duo, quæ maxima putantur onera, paupertatem + et senectutem, ut iis pæne delectari videretur. <hi rend="italic">De Senectute</hi>, c. 5.</note>. +The honours due to his character and talents were, as is frequently +the case, reserved till after his death, when a bust of + him was placed in the family tomb of the Scipios<note place="foot"> Cicero, <hi rend="italic">pro Archia</hi>, c. 9. Valerius Maximus, Lib. VIII. c. 15. § 1.</note>, who, till +the time of Sylla, continued the practice of burying, instead +of burning, their dead. In the days of Livy, the bust still +remained near that sepulchre, beyond the <hi rend="italic">Porta Capena</hi>, + along with the statues of Africanus and Scipio Asiaticus.<note place="foot">Lib. XXXVIII. c. 56.</note> +The tomb was discovered in 1780, on a farm situated between +the Via Appia and Via Latina. The slabs, which have been +since removed to the Vatican, bear several inscriptions, commemorating +different persons of the Scipian family. Neither +statues, nor any other memorial, then existed of Africanus +<pb n="66"/><anchor id="Pg066"/>himself, or of Asiaticus<note place="foot">Bankes, <hi rend="italic">Civil History of Rome</hi>, Vol. I. p. 357. Hobhouse, <hi rend="italic">Illustrations of + Childe Harold</hi>, p. 167.</note>; but a laurelled bust of Pepperino +stone, which was found in this tomb, and which now stands +on the Sarcophagus of Scipio Barbatus in the Vatican, is supposed + to be that of Ennius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Rome in the 19th Century</hi>, Letter 36.</note>. There is also still extant an + epitaph on this poet, reported to have been written by himself<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Tuscul. Disput.</hi> Lib. I. c. 15.</note>, +<anchor id="corr066"/><corr sic="stongly">strongly</corr> characteristic of that overweening conceit and +that high estimation of his own talents, which are said to have +formed the chief blemish of his character:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Aspicite, O cives, senis Ennî imaginis formam;</q></l> +<l>Hic vestrum panxit maxuma facta patrum.</l> +<l>Nemo me lacrumis decoret, nec funera fletu</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Faxit—cur? volito vivus per ora virûm<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Romans, the form of Ennius here behold,</q></l> + <l>Who sung your fathers’ matchless deeds of old.</l> + <l>My fate let no lament or tear deplore,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">I live in fame, although I breathe no more.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> + The lines formerly quoted<note place="foot">See above, <ref target="qvp061">p. 61.</ref></note>, which were written by Nævius +for his tomb-stone, express as high a sense of his own poetical +merits as the above verses; but there is in them something +plaintive and melancholy, quite different from the triumphant +exultation in the epitaph of Ennius. +</p> + +<p> +To judge by the fragments of his works which remain, +Ennius greatly surpassed his predecessors, not only in poetical +genius, but in the art of versification. By his time, indeed, +the best models of Greek composition had begun to be studied +at Rome. Ennius particularly professed to have imitated +Homer, and tried to persuade his countrymen that the soul +and genius of that great poet had revived in him, through the +medium of a peacock, according to the process of Pythagorean +transmigration. It is to this fantastic genealogy that +Persius has alluded in his 6th satire:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Cor jubet hoc Enni, postquam destertuit esse</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mæonides Quintus, pavone ex Pythagoreo.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +From the following lines of Lucretius it would appear, that +Ennius somewhere in his works had feigned that the shade of +Homer appeared to him, and explained to him the nature and +laws of the universe:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Etsi præterea tamen esse Acherusia Templa</q></l> +<l>Ennius æternis exponit versibus edens;</l> +<l>Quo neque permanent animæ, neque corpora nostra,</l> +<pb n="67"/><anchor id="Pg067"/><l>Sed quædam simulacra modis pallentia miris:</l> +<l>Unde, sibi exortam, semper florentis Homeri</l> +<l>Commemorat speciem, lacrumas effundere salsas</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Cœpisse, et rerum naturam expandere dictis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Accordingly, we find in the fragments of Ennius many imitations +of the Iliad and Odyssey. It is, however, the Greek +tragic writers whom Ennius has chiefly imitated; and indeed +it appears from the fragments which remain, that all his plays +were rather translations from the dramas of Sophocles and +Euripides, on the same subjects which he has chosen, than +original tragedies. They are founded on the old topics of +Priam and Paris, Hector and Hecuba; and truly Ennius, as +well as most other Latin tragedians, seems to have anticipated +Horace’s maxim— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Rectus Iliacum carmen deducis in actus,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quamsi proferres ignota indictaque primus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But although it be quite clear that all the plays of Ennius +were translated, or closely imitated, from the Greek, there is +occasionally some difficulty in fixing on the drama which was +followed, and also in ascertaining whether there be any original +passage whatever in the Latin imitation. This difficulty +arises from the practice adopted by the Greek dramatists, of +new modelling their tragedies. Euripides, in particular, sometimes +altered his plays after their first representation, in order +to accommodate them to the circumstances of the times, and +to obviate the sarcastic criticisms of Aristophanes, who had +frequently exposed whole scenes to ridicule. With such +views, considerable changes were made on <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia in Aulis</hi>, +the <hi rend="italic">Hippolytus</hi>, and <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>. Euripides is the author from +whom Ennius has chiefly borrowed the fables of his tragedies; +and when Sophocles and Euripides have treated the same +subject, the latter poet has been uniformly preferred. Not +one of the dramas of Ennius has been imitated from Æschylus. +The reason of this is sufficiently obvious: The plays of +Æschylus have little involution of plot, and are rather what +we should now term dramatic sketches, than tragedies. The +plots of Sophocles are more complex than those of Æschylus; +but the tragedies of Euripides are the most involved of all. +Now, it may be presumed, that a tragedy crowded with action, +and filled with the bustle of a complicated fable, was +best adapted to the taste of the Romans, because we <hi rend="italic">know</hi> +that this was their taste in comedy. Plautus combined two +Greek comedies to form one Latin; and the representation of +the Hecyra of Terence, the only Latin play formed on the +<pb n="68"/><anchor id="Pg068"/>simple Greek model, was repeatedly abandoned by the people +before it was concluded, for the sake of amusements of more +tumult and excitement. +</p> + +<p> +Of <hi rend="italic">Achilles</hi>, which, in alphabetical order, is the first of the +plays of Ennius, there are just extant seven lines, which have +been preserved by Nonius and Festus; and from such remains +it is impossible to know what part of the life or actions of the +Grecian hero Ennius had selected as the subject of his plot. +There were many Greek tragedies on the story of Achilles, of +which, one by Aristarchus of Tegea, was the most celebrated, +and is supposed to have been that from which Ennius copied. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Ajax</hi>. Sophocles was author of two tragedies founded on +the events of the life of Ajax;—<hi rend="italic">Ajax Flagellifer</hi>, and <hi rend="italic">Ajax +Locrensis</hi>. The first turns on the phrensy with which the +Grecian hero was seized, on being refused the arms of Achilles, +and it may be conjectured, from a single fragment, apparently +at the very close of the tragedy by Ennius, and which +describes the attendants raising the body of Ajax, streaming +with blood, that this was the piece <anchor id="corr068"/><corr sic="translaed">translated</corr> by the Roman +poet. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Alcmæon</hi>. This play, of which the fable closely resembles +the story of Orestes, has by some been attributed to the Latin +poet Quintus Catulus. The transports of Alcmæon had been + frequently exhibited on the Greek stage<note place="foot">Alcmæon olim tragicorum pulpita lassavit cum furore suo. Ba. <hi rend="italic">in Statium</hi>. + Tom. II.</note>. The drama of +Ennius was taken from a tragedy of Euripides, which is now +lost, but its subject is well known from the Thebaid of Statius. +The soothsayer Amphiaraus, foreseeing that he would perish +at the siege of Thebes, concealed himself from the crimps of +those days; but his wife, Eryphile, who alone knew the place +of his retreat, being bribed by the gift of a mantle and necklace, +revealed the secret to one of the <q>Seven before Thebes,</q> +who compelled him to share in the expedition. Before death, +the prophet enjoined his son, Alcmæon, to avenge him on his +faithless wife. The youth, in compliance with this pious command, +slew his mother, and was afterwards tormented by the +Furies, who would only be appeased by a gift of the whole +<hi rend="italic">paraphernalia</hi> of Eryphile, which were accordingly hung up in +their temple. As soon as their persecution ceased, he married +the fair Calirrhoe, daughter of Achelous, and precipitately +judging that the consecrated necklace would be better bestowed +on his beautiful bride than on the beldame by whom +he had so long been haunted, he contrived, on false pretences, +to purloin it from the place where it was deposited; but the +<pb n="69"/><anchor id="Pg069"/>Furies were not to be so choused out of their perquisites, and +in consequence of his rash preference, Alcmæon was compelled +to suffer a renewed phrensy, and to undergo a fresh + course of expiatory ceremonies<note place="foot">Those who wish more particulars concerning the necklace may consult Bayle, + Art. <hi rend="italic">Calirhoe</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Alexander</hi> (<hi rend="italic">Paris</hi>). The plot of this play hinges on the +destruction of Troy. The passages which remain are a heavenly +admonition to Priam on the crimes of his son, a lamentation +for the death of Hector, and a prediction of Cassandra +concerning the wooden horse. Planck, in his recent edition +of the <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi> of Ennius, while he does not deny that our poet +may have written a tragedy with the title of <hi rend="italic">Alexander</hi>, is of +opinion that the fragments quoted as from this play in the editions +of Ennius belong properly to his <hi rend="italic">Alexandra</hi> (<hi rend="italic">Cassandra</hi>), +to which subject they are perfectly applicable. This German +critic has also collected a good many fragments belonging to +the <hi rend="italic">Cassandra</hi>, which had been omitted in Columna and +Merula’s editions of Ennius. The longest of these passages, +delivered by Cassandra in the style of a prophecy, seems to +refer to events previous to the Trojan war—the judgment of +Paris, and arrival of Helen from Sparta. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Andromache</hi>. It is uncertain from what Greek writer this +tragedy has been translated. It seems to be founded on the +lamentable story of Andromache, who fell, with other Trojan +captives, to the share of Neoptolemus, and saw her only son, +Astyanax, torn from her embraces, to be precipitated from the +summit of a tower, in compliance with the injunctions of an +oracle. Among the fragments of this play, we possess one of +the longest passages extant of the works of Ennius, containing +a pathetic lamentation of Andromache for the fall and conflagration +of Troy, with a comparison between its smoking ruins +and former splendour. This passage Cicero styles, <q>Præclarum +Carmen!</q>—<q>Est enim,</q> he adds, <q>et rebus, et verbis, et + modis lugubre<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tuscul. Disput.</hi> Lib. III. c. 19.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 15">—— <q rend="post: none">Quid petam</q></l> +<l>Præsidi aut exsequar? quo nunc aut exilio aut fuga freta sim?</l> +<l>Arce et urbe orba sum; quo accidam? quo applicem?</l> +<l>Cui nec aræ patriæ domi stant; fractæ et disjectæ jacent,</l> +<l>Fana flamma deflagrata; tosti alti stant parietes.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">O Pater, O Patria, O Priami domus;</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Septum altisono cardine templum:</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Vidi ego te, adstante ope barbarica,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Tectis cælatis, laqueatis,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Auro, ebore instructum regifice.</l> +<pb n="70"/><anchor id="Pg070"/><l rend="margin-left: 4">Hæc omnia vidi inflammari,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Priamo vi vitam evitari,</l> + <l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="pre: none">Jovis aram sanguine turpari<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Where shall I refuge seek or aid obtain?</q></l> + <l>In flight or exile can I safety gain?—</l> + <l>Our city sacked—even scorched the walls of stone.</l> + <l>Our fanes consumed, and altars all o’erthrown.</l> + <l>O Father—country—Priam’s ruined home;</l> + <l>O hallowed temple with resounding dome,</l> + <l>And vaulted roof with fretted gold illumed—</l> + <l>All now, alas! these eyes have been consumed:</l> + <l>Have seen the foe shed royal Priam’s blood,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">And stain Jove’s altar with the crimson flood.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Andromache Molottus</hi> is translated from the <hi rend="italic">Andromache</hi> of +Euripides, and is so called from Molottus, the son of Neoptolemus +and Andromache. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Andromeda</hi>. Livius Andronicus had formerly written a +Latin play on the well-known story of Perseus and Andromeda, +which was translated from Sophocles. The play of Ennius, +however, on the same subject, was a version of a tragedy of +Euripides, now chiefly known from the ridicule cast on it in +the fifth act of Aristophanes’ <hi rend="italic">Feasts of Ceres</hi>. That Ennius’ +drama was translated from Euripides, is sufficiently manifest, +from a comparison of its fragments with the passages of the +Greek Andromeda, preserved by Stobæus. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Athamas</hi>. There is only one short fragment of this play +now extant. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Cresphontes</hi>. Merope, believing that her son Cresphontes +had been slain by a person who was brought before her, discovers, +when about to avenge on him the death of her child, +that she whom she had mistaken for the murderer is Cresphontes +himself. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>. Of this play there is only one line remaining, +and of course it is almost impossible to ascertain from what +Greek original it was borrowed. Even this single verse has +by several critics been supposed to be falsely attributed to + Ennius, and to belong, in fact, to the Dulorestes of Pacuvius<note place="foot">This subject is fully discussed in Eberhardt, <hi rend="italic">Zustand der <anchor id="corr070"/><corr sic="Schonen">Schönen</corr> Wissenschaften + bei den <corr sic="Romern">Römern</corr></hi>, p. 38. Ed. Altona, 1801.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Erectheus</hi>. There is just enough of this play extant to have +satisfied Columna, one of the editors of Ennius, that it was +taken from a tragedy of the same name by Euripides. As +told by Hyginus, the fable concerning Erectheus, King of +Attica, was, that he had four daughters, who all pledged +themselves not to survive the death of any one of their number. +Eumolpus, son of Neptune, being slain at the siege of Athens, +his father required that one of the daughters of Erectheus +should be sacrificed to him in compensation. This having +<pb n="71"/><anchor id="Pg071"/>been accomplished, her sisters slew themselves as a matter of +course, and Erectheus was soon afterwards struck by Jupiter +with thunder, at the solicitation of Neptune. The longest +passage preserved from this tragedy is the speech of Colophonia, +when about to be sacrificed to Neptune by her father. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Eumenides</hi>. This play, translated from Æschylus, exhibited +the phrensy of Orestes, and his final absolution from the vengeance +of the Furies. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Hectoris Lytris vel Lustra</hi>, so called from <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">λυω</foreign><!--[Greek: lyô]-->, <hi rend="italic">solvo</hi>, turned +on the redemption from Achilles by Priam, of the body of +Hector. It appears, however, from the fragments, that the +combat of Hector, and the brutal treatment of his <anchor id="corr071"/><corr sic="corse">corpse</corr> by +Achilles, had been represented or related in the early scenes +of the piece. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Hecuba</hi>. This is a free translation from the Greek <hi rend="italic">Hecuba</hi>, +perhaps the most tragic of all the dramas of Euripides. From +the work of Ennius, there is still extant a speech by the shade +of Polydorus, announcing in great form his arrival from Acheron. +This soliloquy, which is a good deal expanded from the +original Greek, always produced a great sensation in the Roman + theatre, and is styled by Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Grande Carmen</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tuscul. Disput.</hi> Lib. I. c. 16.</note>.— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Adsum, atque advenio Acherunte, vix via alta, atque ardua,</q></l> +<l>Per speluncas saxeis structas aspereis pendentibus</l> +<l>Maxumeis; ubi rigida constat et crassa caligo inferûm;</l> +<l>Unde animæ excitantur obscura umbra, aperto ostio</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Alti Acheruntis, falso sanguine imagines mortuorum<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">I come—retraced the paths profound that lead</q></l> + <l>Through rugged caves, from mansions of the dead:</l> + <l>Mid these huge caverns Cold and Darkness dwell,</l> + <l>And Shades pass through them from the gates of Hell—</l> + <l>When roused from rest, by blood of victims slain,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">The Sorcerer calls them forth with rites obscene.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +A speech of Hecuba, on seeing the dead body of Polydorus, +and in which she reproaches the Greeks as having no punishment +for the murder of a parent or a guest, seems to have been +added by Ennius himself, at least it is not in the Greek original +of Euripides. On the whole, indeed, the <hi rend="italic">Hecuba</hi> of Ennius +appears, so far as we can judge from the fragments, to be the +least servile of his imitations. In Columna’s edition of Ennius, +an opportunity is afforded by corresponding quotations from +the Greek <hi rend="italic">Hecuba</hi>, of comparing the manner in which the +Latin poet has varied, amplified, or compressed the thoughts +of his original. In Euripides, Hecuba, while persuading +Ulysses to intercede for Polixena, says— +</p> +<pb n="72"/><anchor id="Pg072"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Τὸ δ’ αξίωμα, καν κακως λέγῃς, τὸ σόν</foreign><!--[Greek: To d' axiôma, kan kakôs legês, to son--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Πείσει. Λόγος γαρ ἔκ τ’ αδοξούντων ἰων,</foreign><!--Peisei. Logos gar ek t' adoxountôn iôn,--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Και ’κ των δοκούντων αὐτὸς, οὐ ταυτὸν σθένει.</foreign><!--Kai 'ek tôn dokountôn autos, ou tauton sthenei.]--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Ennius imitates this as follows: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Hæc tu, etsi perverse dices, facile Achivos flexeris;</q></l> +<l>Namque opulenti cum loquuntur pariter atque ignobiles,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Eadem dicta, eademque oratio æqua non æque valent.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This has been copied by Plautus, and from him by Moliere in +his <hi rend="italic">Amphitrion</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Tous les discours sont des sottises</q></l> +<l>Partant d’un homme sans eclat;</l> +<l>Ce seroient paroles exquisses,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Si c’etoit un grand qui parlàt.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The last link in this chain of imitation, is Pope’s well-known +lines— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">What woful stuff this madrigal would be,</q></l> +<l>In some starved hackney sonnetteer or me!</l> +<l>But let a lord once own the happy lines,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">How the wit brightens, how the style refines!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Iliona sive Polydorus</hi>.—Priam, during the siege of Troy, +had entrusted his son Polydorus to the care of Polymnestor, +King of Thrace, who was married to Iliona, daughter of Priam, +and slew his guest, in order to possess himself of the treasure +which had been sent along with him. The only passage of +the play which remains, is one in which the shade of Polydorus +calls on Hecuba to arise and bury her murdered son. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Iphigenia</hi>.—Ennius, as already mentioned, appears invariably +to have translated from Euripides, in preference to Sophocles, +when the same subject had been treated by both these +poets. Sophocles had written a tragedy on the topic of the +well-known <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia in Aulis</hi> of Euripides; but it is the latter +piece which has been adopted by the Roman poet. +</p> + +<p> +Boeckius has shown, in a learned dissertation, that Euripides + wrote two <hi rend="italic">Iphigenias in Aulis</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Græcæ Tragœdiæ principum Æschyli, &c. num ea quæ supersunt genuina + omnia sunt</hi>. Ed. <anchor id="corr072"/><corr sic="Hiedelberg">Heidelberg</corr>, 1808.</note>. From the first, which has +perished, Aristophanes parodied the verses introduced in his +<hi rend="italic">Frogs</hi>; and it was on this work that Ennius formed his Latin +<hi rend="italic">Iphigenia</hi>. The <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia</hi> now extant, and published in the +editions of Euripides, is a <hi rend="italic">recension</hi> of the original drama, +which was undertaken on account of the ridicule thrown on +it by Aristophanes, and was not acted till after the death of +<pb n="73"/><anchor id="Pg073"/>its author. Boeckius, indeed, thinks, that it was written by the +younger Euripides, the nephew of the more celebrated dramatist; +hence some of the lines of Ennius, which, on comparison +with the <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia</hi> now extant, appear to us original, were +probably translated from the first written <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia</hi>. Such, +perhaps, are the jingling verses concerning the disadvantages +of idleness, which are supposed, not very naturally, to be sung +while weather-bound in Aulis, by the Greek soldiers, who +form the chorus of this tragedy instead of the women of Chalcis +in the play of Euripides:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Otio qui nescit uti, plus negoti habet,</q></l> +<l>Quam quum est negotium in negotio;</l> +<l>Nam cui quod agat institutum est, in illo negotio</l> +<l>Id agit; studet ibi, mentem atque animum delectat suum.</l> +<l>Otioso in otio animus nescit quid sibi velit.</l> +<l>Hoc idem est; neque domi nunc nos, nec militiæ sumus:</l> +<l>Imus huc, hinc illuc; quum illuc ventum est, ire illinc lubet.</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Incerte errat animus—<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Who knows not leisure to enjoy,</q></l> + <l>Toils more than those whom toils employ;</l> + <l>For they who toil with purposed end,</l> + <l>Mid all their labours pleasure blend—</l> + <l>But they whose time no labours fill,</l> + <l>Have in their minds nor wish nor will:</l> + <l>’Tis so with us, called far from home,</l> + <l>Nor yet to fields of battle come—</l> + <l>We hither haste, then thither go,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Our minds veer round as breezes blow.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>.—This play is imitated from the <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi> of Euripides. + Since the time of Paulus Manutius<note place="foot">Comment. ad Cic. <hi rend="italic">Ep. ad Fam.</hi> VII. 6. See also Scaliger, Vossius, &c.</note>, an idea has prevailed +that Ennius was the author of two plays on the subject of +Medea—one entitled <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, and the other <hi rend="italic">Medea Exsul</hi>, +both imitated from Greek originals of Euripides. This opinion +was formed in consequence of there being several passages of +the <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi> of Ennius, to which corresponding passages cannot +be found in the <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi> of Euripides, now extant; and it was +confirmed by the grammarians sometimes quoting the play by +the title <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, and at others by that of <hi rend="italic">Medea Exsul</hi>. Planck, +however, in his recent edition of the fragments of the Latin +tragedy, conjectures that there was only one play, and that +this play was entitled by Ennius the <hi rend="italic">Medea Exsul</hi>, which +name was appropriate to the subject; but that when quoted +by the critics and old grammarians, it was sometimes cited, +as was natural, by its full title, at others simply <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>. The +lines in the Latin play, to which parallel passages cannot be +found in Euripides, he believes to be of Ennius’ own invention. +Osannus thinks, that neither the opinion of Manutius, +<pb n="74"/><anchor id="Pg074"/>nor of Planck, is quite accurate. He believes that Euripides +wrote a <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, which he afterwards revised and altered, in +order to obviate the satiric criticisms of Aristophanes. The +Greek <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, which we now have, he supposes to be compounded +of the original copy and the recension,—the ancient +grammarians having interpolated the manuscripts. Ennius, +he maintains, employed the original tragedy; and hence in +the Latin play, we now find translations of lines which were +omitted both in the recension and in the compound tragedy, + which is at present extant<note place="foot">Osannus, <hi rend="italic">Analecta Critica</hi>, c. 5.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi> of Ennius was a popular drama at Rome, and +was considered one of the best productions of its author. +Cicero asks, if there be any one such a foe to the Roman +name, as to reject or despise the <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi> of Ennius. From the +romantic interest of the subject, Medea was the heroine of not +less than four epic poems; and no fable, of Greek antiquity, +was more frequently dramatized by the Latin poets. Attius, +Varro, Ovid, and Seneca, successively imitated the tragedy of +Ennius, and improved on their model. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Phœnix</hi>.—There were two persons of this name in mythological +story. One the son of Agenor, and brother of Cadmus, +who gave name to Phœnicia; the other the preceptor of +Achilles, who accompanied that hero to the Trojan war. The +only reason for supposing that the tragedy of Ennius related +to this latter person is, that a play founded on some part of +his life was written by Euripides, from whom the Roman poet +has borrowed so much. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Telamon</hi>.—This play, of which no Greek original is known, +seems to have been devoted to a representation of the misfortunes +of Telamon, particularly the concluding period of his +life, in which he heard of the death of his eldest son Ajax, +and the exile of his second son Teucer. To judge from the +fragments which remain, it must have been by far the finest +drama of Ennius. He thus happily versifies the celebrated +sentiment of Anaxagoras, and puts it into the mouth of Telamon, +when he hears of the death of his son— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ego quom genui, tum moriturum scivi, et ei rei sustuli;</q></l> +<l>Præterea ad Trojam quom misi ad defendendam Græciam,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Scibam me in mortiferum bellum, non in epulas mittere<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">I rear’d him, subject to death’s equal laws,</q></l> + <l>And when to Troy I sent him in our cause,</l> + <l>I knew I urged him into mortal fight,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">And not to feasts or banquets of delight.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Ennius being an inhabitant of <hi rend="italic">Magna Græcia</hi>, probably +held the Tuscan soothsayers and diviners in great contempt. +<pb n="75"/><anchor id="Pg075"/>There is a long passage cited by the grammarians as from +this tragedy, (but which, I think, must rather have belonged +to his satires,) directed against that learned body, and calculated +to give them considerable offence— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Non habeo denique nauci Marsum augurem,</q></l> +<l>Non vicanos haruspices, non de circo astrologos,</l> +<l>Non Isiacos conjectores, non interpretes somniûm:</l> +<l>Non enim sunt ii, aut scientiâ, aut arte divinei;</l> +<l>Sed superstitiosi vates, impudentesque hariolei,</l> +<l>Aut inertes, aut insanei, aut quibus egestas imperat:</l> +<l>Qui sibi semitam non sapiunt, alteri monstrant viam;</l> +<l>Quibus divitias pollicentur ab iis drachmam ipsei petunt:</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">De his divitiis sibi deducant drachmam; reddant cætera<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">For no Marsian augur (whom fools view with awe,)</q></l> + <l>Nor diviner nor star-gazer, care I a straw;</l> + <l>The Egyptian quack, an expounder of dreams,</l> + <l>Is neither in science nor art what he seems;</l> + <l>Superstitious and shameless, they prowl through our streets,</l> + <l>Some hungry, some crazy, but all of them cheats.</l> + <l>Impostors! who vaunt that to others they’ll show</l> + <l>A path, which themselves neither travel nor know.</l> + <l>Since they promise us wealth, if we pay for their pains,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Let them take from that wealth, and bestow what remains.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There is a good deal of wit and archness in the two concluding +lines, and the whole breathes a spirit of free-thinking, +such as one might expect from the translator of Euhemerus. +In another passage, indeed, but which, I presume, was attributed +to an impious character, or one writhing under the +stroke of recent calamity, it is roundly declared that the gods +take no concern in human affairs, for if they did, the good +would prosper, and the wicked suffer, whereas it is quite the +contrary: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ego Deûm genus esse semper dixi, et dicam cœlitum;</q></l> +<l>Sed eos non curare opinor, quid agat humanum genus;</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Nam si curent, bene bonis sit, male malis; quod nunc abest<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Yes! there are gods; but they no thought bestow</q></l> + <l>On human deeds—on mortal bliss or woe—</l> + <l>Else would such ills our wretched race assail?</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Would the good suffer?—would the bad prevail?</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Telephus</hi> is probably taken from a lost play of Euripides, +ridiculed by Aristophanes in his <hi rend="italic">Acharnenses</hi>, from a scene of +which it would seem that Telephus had appeared on the stage +in tattered garments. The passages of the Latin play which +remain, exhibit Telephus as an exile from his kingdom, wandering +about in ragged habiliments. The lines of Horace, in +his Art of Poetry, (a work which is devoted to the subject of +the Roman drama,) are probably in allusion to this tragedy: +</p> +<pb n="76"/><anchor id="Pg076"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Telephus et Peleus, cum pauper et exsul, uterque</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Projicit ampullas et sesquipedalia verba.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Thyestes</hi>.—The loose and familiar numbers in which the +tragedy of Telephus was written, were by no means suitable to +the atrocious subject of the Supper of Thyestes. Ennius +accordingly has been censured by Cicero, in a passage of his +<hi rend="italic">Orator</hi>, for employing them in this drama.—<q rend="post: none">Similia sunt +quædam apud nostros; velut illa in Thyeste,</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>‘Quemnam te esse dicam! qui tarda in senectute,’</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<q rend="pre: none">Et quæ sequuntur: quæ, nisi cum tibicen accesserit, orationi +sunt solutæ simillima.</q> There can therefore be little doubt +that the passage in Horace’s Art of Poetry, in which a tragedy +on the subject of Thyestes is blamed as flat and prosaic, and +hardly rising above the level of ordinary conversation in +comedy, alluded to the work of Ennius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Indignatur item privatis, ac prope socco</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Dignis carminibus, narrari cœna Thyestæ.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Yet this spiritless tragedy, was very popular in Rome, and +continued to be frequently represented, till Varius treated the +same subject in a manner, as we are informed by Quintilian, + equal to the Greeks<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Instit. Orator.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +It thus appears that Ennius has little claim to originality or +invention as a tragic author. Perhaps it may seem remarkable, +that a poet of his powerful genius did not rather write +new plays, than copy servilely from the Greeks. But nothing +is ever invented where borrowing will as well serve the purpose. +Rome had few artists, in consequence of the facility with which +the finest specimens of the arts were procured by plundering +the towns of Sicily and Greece. Now, at the period in which +Ennius flourished, the productions of Grecian literature were +almost as new to the Romans as the most perfectly original +compositions. Thus, the dramatic works of Ennius were +possessed of equal novelty for his audience as if wholly his +own; while a great deal of trouble was saved to himself. The +example, however, was unfortunate, as it communicated to +Roman literature a character of servility, and of imitation, or +rather of translation, from the Greek, which so completely +pervaded it, that succeeding poets were most faultless when +they copied most closely, and at length, when they abandoned +the guides whom they had so long followed, they fell into +declamation and bombast. Probably, had the compositions of +<pb n="77"/><anchor id="Pg077"/>Ennius been original, they would have been less perfect, than +by being thus imitated, or nearly translated, from the masterpieces +of Greece. But the literature of his country might +ultimately have attained a higher eminence. The imitative +productions of Ennius may be likened to those trees which are +transplanted when far advanced in growth. Much at first +appears to have been gained; but it is certain, that he who +sets the seedling is more useful than the transplanter, and +that, while the trees removed from their native soil lose their +original beauty and luxuriance without increase in magnitude, +the seedling swells in its parent earth to immensity of size—fresh, +blooming, and verdant in youth, vigorous in maturity, +and venerable in old age. +</p> + +<p> +Nor, although Ennius was the first writer who introduced +satiric composition into Rome, are his pretensions, in this +respect, to originality, very distinguished. He adapted the +ancient satires of the Tuscan and Oscan stage to the closet, +by refining their grossness, softening their asperity, and introducing +railleries borrowed from the Greek poets, with whom +he was familiar. His satires thus appear to have been a +species of <hi rend="italic">centos</hi> made up from passages of various poems, +which, by slight alterations, were humorously or satirically applied, +and chiefly to the delineation of character: <q>Carmen,</q> +says Diomedes the grammarian, <q>quod ex variis poematibus constabat +satira vocabatur, quale scripserunt Pacuvius et Ennius.</q> +The fragments which remain of these satires are too short and +broken to allow us even to divine their subject. That entitled +<hi rend="italic">Asotus</hi> vel <hi rend="italic">Sotadicus</hi>, is the representation of a luxurious, +dissolute man, and was so termed from Sotades, a voluptuous +Cretan poet. Quintilian also mentions, that one of his satires +contained a Dialogue between Life and Death, contending +with each other, a mode of composition suggested perhaps by +the celebrated allegory of Prodicus. We are farther informed +by Aulus Gellius, that he introduced into another satire, with + great skill and beauty, Æsop’s fable of the Larks<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noctes Atticæ</hi>, Lib. II. c. 29.</note>, now well + known through the imitation of Fontaine<note place="foot">Lib. IV. Fab. 22. <hi rend="italic">L’Alouette et ses petits avec le maitre d’un champ</hi>.</note>. The lark having +built her nest among some early corn, feared that it might be +reaped before her young ones were fit to take wing. She +therefore desired them to report to her whatever conversation +they might hear in the fields during her absence. They first +informed her, that the husbandman had come to the spot, and +desired his son to summon their neighbours and friends to +assist in cutting the crop the next morning. The lark, on +<pb n="78"/><anchor id="Pg078"/>hearing this, declares, that there is no occasion to be in any +haste in removing. On the following day, it is again reported, +that the husbandman had desired that his relations should be +requested to assist him; and the lark is still of opinion that +there is no necessity to hurry away. At length, however, the +young larks relate, that the husbandman had announced that +he would execute the work himself. On hearing this, the old +lark said it was now time to be gone. She accordingly removed +her younglings, and the corn was immediately cut +down by the master. From this tale Ennius deduces as the +moral, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Hoc erit tibi argumentum semper in promptu situm;</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ne quid expectes amicos, quod tute agere possis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is certainly much to be regretted that we possess so +scanty fragments of these satires, which would have been +curious as the first attempts at a species of composition which +was carried to such perfection by succeeding Latin poets, and +which has been regarded as almost peculiar to the Romans. +</p> + +<p> +The great work, however, of Ennius, and of which we have +still considerable remains, was his Annals, or metrical chronicles, +devoted to the celebration of Roman exploits, from the +earliest periods to the conclusion of the Istrian war. These +Annals were written by our poet in his old age; at least, +Aulus Gellius informs us, on the authority of Varro, that the + twelfth book was finished by him in his sixty-seventh year<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. XVII. c. 21. Quibus consulibus natum esse Q. Ennium + poetam, M. Varro, in primo <hi rend="italic">de Poetis</hi> libro, scripsit: eumque quum septimum et + sexagesimum annum ageret duodecimum Annalem scripsisse: idque ipsum Ennium + in eodem libro dicere.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +It may perhaps appear strange, that, when the fabulous +exploits, the superstitions, the characters and the manners, of +the heroic ages, were so admirably adapted for poetical +imagery, and had been so successfully employed in Greece, +the chief work of the Father of Roman Song should have been +a sort of versified newspaper, like the <hi rend="italic">Henriade</hi> of Voltaire, +or the <hi rend="italic">Araucana</hi> of Alonco de Ercilla: For in other countries +poetry has been earliest devoted to the decoration of those +marvels in which the <hi rend="italic">amantes mira Camœnæ</hi> chiefly rejoice. +In most lands, however, the origin of poetry was coeval with +the rise of the nation, and every thing seems wondrous to an +ignorant and timid race. The Greeks, in their first poetical +age, peopled every grove and lake with fauns and naiads, or +personified the primeval powers of nature. They sung the +fables concerning their gods, and the exploits of heroes, in +<pb n="79"/><anchor id="Pg079"/>those ancient verses which have been combined in the Theogony +attributed to Hesiod, and those immortal rhapsodies +which have formed the basis of the Homeric poems. The +marvellous vision of Dante was the earliest effort of the Italian +muse; and some of the first specimens of verse in France and +England were wild adventures in love or arms, interspersed +with stories of demons and enchanters. But in Rome, though +the first effort of the language was in poetry, five hundred +years had elapsed from the foundation of the city before this +effort was made. At that period, the Romans were a rude +but rational race. The locks of Curius were perhaps uncombed; +but though the Republic had as yet produced no +character of literary elegance, she had given birth to Cincinnatus, +and Fabricius, and Camillus. Her citizens had neither +been rendered timid nor indolent by their superstitions, but +were actively employed in agriculture or in arms. They were +a less contemplative and imaginative race than the Greeks. +Their spirit was indeed sufficiently warlike; but that peculiar +spirit of adventure, (which characterised the early ages of +Greece, and the middle ages of modern Europe,) had, if it +ever existed, long ago ceased in Rome. By this time, the +Roman armies were too well disciplined, and the system of +warfare too regular, to admit a description of the picturesque +combats of the Greek and Trojan charioteers. Poetry was +thus too late in its birth to take a natural flight. In such +circumstances, the bard, however rich or lofty might be his +conceptions, would not listen to his own taste or inspiration, +but select the theme which was likely to prove most popular; +and the Romans, being a national and ambitious people, +would be more gratified by the jejune relation of their own +exploits, than by the <hi rend="italic">speciosa miracula</hi> of the most sublime +or romantic invention. +</p> + +<p> +The Annals of Ennius were partly founded on those ancient +traditions and old heroic ballads, which Cicero, on the authority +of Cato’s <hi rend="italic">Origines</hi>, mentions as having been sung at +feasts by the guests, many centuries before the age of Cato, + in praise of the heroes of Rome<note place="foot">See above, <ref target="Pg040">p. 40</ref>.</note>. Niebuhr has attempted to +show, that all the memorable events of Roman history had +been versified in ballads, or metrical chronicles, in the Saturnian +measure, before the time of Ennius; who, according to +him, merely expressed in the Greek hexameter, what his predecessors +had delivered in a ruder strain, and then maliciously +depreciated these ancient compositions, in order that he himself + might be considered as the founder of Roman poetry<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Romische Geschichte</hi>, Tom. I. p. 179.</note>. +<pb n="80"/><anchor id="Pg080"/>The devotion of the Decii, and death of the Fabian family,—the +stories of Scævola, Cocles, and Coriolanus,—Niebuhr believes +to have been the subjects of romantic ballads. Even +Fabius Pictor, according to this author, followed one of these +old legends in his narrative concerning Mars and the Wolf, +and his whole history of Romulus. Livy, too, in his account +of the death of Lucretia, has actually transcribed from one of +these productions; since what Sextus says, on entering the +chamber of Lucretia, is nearly in the Saturnian measure:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Tace, Lucretia, inquit, Sextus Tarquinius sum,</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Ferrum in manu est, moriere si emiseris vocem<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Romische Geschichte</hi>, Tom. I. p. 318.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But the chief work, according to Niebuhr, from which Ennius +borrowed, was a romantic epopee, or chronicle, made up from +these heroic ballads about the end of the fourth century of +Rome, commencing with the accession of Tarquinius Priscus, +and ending with the battle of Regillus. The arrival, says +Niebuhr, of that monarch under the name of Lucumo—his +exploits and victories—his death—then the history of Servius +Tullius—the outrageous pride of Tullia—the murder of the +lawful monarch—the fall of the last Tarquin, preceded by a +supernatural warning—Lucretia—Brutus and the truly Homeric +battle of Regillus—compose an epic, which, in poetical +incident, and splendour of fancy, surpasses everything produced + in the latter ages of Rome<note place="foot">Id. Tom. I. p. 178.</note>. The battle of Regillus, +in particular, as described by the annalists, bears evident +marks of its poetical origin. It was not a battle between two +hosts, but a struggle of heroes. As in the fights painted in +the Iliad, the champions meet in single combat, and turn by +individual exertions the tide of victory. The dictator Posthumius +wounds King Tarquin, whom he had encountered at the +first onset. The Roman knight Albutius engages with the +Latin chief Mamilius, but is wounded by him, and forced to +quit the field. Mamilius then nearly breaks the Roman line, +but is slain by the Consul Herminius, which decides the fate of +the day. After the battle of Regillus, all the events are not so +completely poetical; but in the siege of Veii we have a representation +of the ten years war of Troy. The secret introduction +of the troops by Camillus into the middle of the city resembles +the story of the wooden horse, and the Etruscan statue + of Juno corresponds to the Trojan Palladium<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Romische Geschichte</hi>, Tom. I. p. 364, &c.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Any period of history may be thus exhibited in the form of +an epic cycle; and, though there can be little doubt of the +<pb n="81"/><anchor id="Pg081"/>existence of ancient Saturnian ballads at Rome, I do not think +that Niebuhr has adduced sufficient proof or authority for his +magnificent epopee, commencing with the accession of Tarquin, +and ending with the battle of Regillus. With regard +to the accusation against Ennius, of depreciating the ancient +materials which he had employed, it is founded on the contempt +which he expresses for the verses of the Fauns and the +Prophets. His obligations, if he owed any, he has certainly +nowhere acknowledged, at least in the fragments which remain; +and he rather betrays an anxiety, at the commencement of his +poem, to carry away the attention of the reader from the Saturnian +muses, and direct it to the Grecian poets,—to Pindus, +and the nymphs of Helicon. +</p> + +<p> +He begins his Annals with an invocation to the nine Muses, +and the account of a vision in which Homer had appeared to +him, and related the story of the metamorphosis already mentioned:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 6"><q rend="post: none">Visus Homerus adesse poeta:</q></l> +<l>Hei mihi qualis erat, quantum mutatus ab illo!</l> +<l>. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .</l> +<l>Septingenti sunt, paulo plus vel minus, anni</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quom memini fieri me pavom.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Ennius afterwards invokes a great number of the Gods, and +then proceeds to the history of the Alban kings. The dream +of the Vestal Virgin Ilia, which announced her pregnancy by +Mars, and the foundation of Rome, is related in verses of considerable +beauty and smoothness, by Ilia to her sister Eurydice.— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Talia commemorat lacrumans, exterrita somno;</q></l> +<l>‘Euridica prognata, pater quam noster amavit,</l> +<l>Vivens vita meum corpus nunc deserit omne.</l> +<l>Nam me visus homo polcer per amœna salicta</l> +<l>Et ripas raptare, locosque novos: ita sola</l> +<l>Post illa, germana soror, errare videbar;</l> +<l>Tardaque vestigare, et quærere, neque posse</l> +<l>Corde capessere: semita nulla pedem stabilibat.</l> +<l>Exin compellare pater me voce videtur</l> +<l>Heis verbis—O gnata, tibi sunt antegerendæ</l> +<l>Ærumnæ; post ex fluvio fortuna resistet.</l> +<l>Hæc pater ecfatus, germana, repente recessit;</l> +<l>Nec sese dedit in conspectum corde cupitus:</l> +<l>Quamquam multa manus ad cœli cærula Templa</l> +<l>Tendebam lacrumans, et blanda voce vocabam.</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Vix ægro tum corde meo me somnus reliquit<note place="foot"><lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">‘Eurydice, my sister,’ thus she spoke,</q></l> + <l>When roused from sleep she, weeping, silence broke—</l> + <l>‘Thou whom my father loved! of life bereft,</l> + <l>Though yet alive, all sense this frame hath left.</l> + <l>A form endowed with more than mortal grace,</l> + <l>Mysterious led me, and with hurried pace,</l> + <l>’Mid ever varying scenes, as wild as new,</l> + <l>O’er banks and meads where pliant osiers grew.</l> + <l>Then left to wander pathless and alone,</l> + <l>I vainly sought thee amid scenes unknown.</l> + <l>My father called, his child forlorn address’d,</l> + <l>And in these words prophetic thoughts express’d:</l> + <l>‘O Daughter, many sorrows yet abide,</l> + <l>Ere fortune’s stream upbears thee on its tide.’</l> + <l>Thus spoke my father; but his form withdrew;</l> + <l>No longer offered to my eager view.</l> + <l>Though oft in vain with soothing voice I call,</l> + <l>And stretch my hands to heaven’s cerulean hall.</l> + <l>Oppressed, and struggling, and with sick’ning heart.</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">At once the vision and my sleep depart.’</q></l> + </lg></note>.’</q></l> +</lg> +<pb n="82"/><anchor id="Pg082"/> + +<p> +In these lines there is considerable elegance and pathos; +and the contest which immediately succeeds between Romulus +and Remus for the sovereignty of Rome, is as remarkable for +dignity and animation: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Curanteis magnâ cum curâ, concupienteis</q></l> +<l>Regnei, dant operam simul auspicio, augurioque:</l> +<l>Hinc Remus auspicio se devovet, atque secundam</l> +<l>Solus avem servat: at Romolus polcer in alto</l> +<l>Quærit Aventino, servans genus altivolantum.</l> +<l>Omnis cura vireis, uter esset Endoperator.</l> +<l>Exspectant, veluti consol, quom mittere signum</l> +<l>Volt, omneis avidei spectant ad carceris oras,</l> +<l>Qua mox emittat picteis ex faucibus currus.</l> +<l>Sic exspectabat populus, atque ore timebat</l> +<l>Rebus, utrei magnei victoria sit data regnei.</l> +<l>Interea Sol albus recessit in infera noctis:</l> +<l>Exin Candida se radiis dedit icta foras lux:</l> +<l>Et simol ex alto longe polcerrima præpes</l> +<l>Læva volavit avis: simol aureus exoritur sol.</l> +<l>Cedunt ter quatuor de cælo corpora sancta</l> +<l>Avium, præpetibus sese, polcreisque loceis dant.</l> +<l>Conspicit inde sibei data Romolus esse priora,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Auspicio regni stabilita scamna, solumque<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">With ceaseless care, eager alike to reign,</q></l> + <l>Both anxious watch some favouring sign to gain,</l> + <l>Remus with prescient gaze observes the sky</l> + <l>Apart, and marks where birds propitious fly.</l> + <l>His godlike brother on the sacred height,</l> + <l>Observant traced the soaring eagle’s flight:</l> + <l>And now the anxious tribes expect from fate</l> + <l>The future monarch of their infant state;</l> + <l>Even as the crowd await at festal games</l> + <l>The consul’s signal, which the sports proclaims.</l> + <l>Their eyes directed to the painted goal,</l> + <l>Eager to see the rival chariots roll.</l> + <l>Meanwhile the radiant sun sinks down to night,</l> + <l>But soon he sheds again the yellow light;</l> + <l>And while the golden orb ascends the sky,</l> + <l>The fowls of heaven on wing propitious fly.</l> + <l>Twelve sacred birds, which gods as omens send,</l> + <l>With flight precipitate on earth descend.</l> + <l>The sign, Quirinus knew, to him alone</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Presaged dominion, and the Roman throne.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +<pb n="83"/><anchor id="Pg083"/> + +<p> +The reigns of the kings, and the contests of the republic +with the neighbouring states previous to the Punic war, occupy + the metrical annals to the end of the sixth book<note place="foot">The Annals were not separated by Ennius himself into books; but were so divided, + long after his death, by the grammarian Q. Vargunteius.—(Suet. <hi rend="italic">de Illust. + Gram.</hi> c. 2.) The fragments of them are arranged under different books in different + editions. In the passages quoted, I have followed the distribution in the edition of + Merula, Lugd. Bat. 1574.</note>, which concludes +with the following noble answer of Pyrrhus to the +Roman ambassadors, who came to ransom the prisoners taken +from them by that prince in battle:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nec mî aurum posco, nec mî pretium dederitis;</q></l> +<l>Nec cauponantes bellum, sed belligerantes;</l> +<l>Ferro, non auro, vitam cernamus utrique,</l> +<l>Vosne velit, an me regnare Hera; quidve ferat sors</l> +<l>Virtute experiamur; et hoc simol accipe dictum:</l> +<l>Quorum virtutei belli fortuna pepercit,</l> +<l>Horumdem me libertatei parcere certum est:</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Dono ducite, doque volentibus cum magneis Dîs<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nor gift I seek, nor shall ye ransom yield;</q></l> + <l>Let us not trade, but combat in the field:</l> + <l>Steel and not gold our being must maintain,</l> + <l>And prove <hi rend="italic">which</hi> nation Fortune wills to reign.</l> + <l>Whom chance of war, despite of valour, spared,</l> + <l>I grant them freedom, and without reward.</l> + <l>Conduct them then, by all the mighty Gods!</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Conduct them freely to their own abodes.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Cicero, in his <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, says, that Ennius did not treat of the + first Punic war, as Nævius had previously written on that subject<note place="foot">Cap. 19.</note>; +to which prior work Ennius thus alludes:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 12"><q rend="post: none">Scripsere alii rem,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Versibus, quos olim Faunei, vatesque canebant.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +P. Merula, however, who edited the fragments of Ennius, is of +opinion, that this passage of Cicero can only mean that he had +not entered into much detail of its events, as he finds several +lines in the seventh book, which, he thinks, evidently apply +to the first Carthaginian war, particularly the description of +naval preparations, and the building of the first fleet with +which the Carthaginians were attacked by the Romans. In +some of the editions of Ennius, the character of the friend and +military adviser of Servilius, generally supposed to be intended + as a portrait of the poet himself<note place="foot">Gaddius, <hi rend="italic">de Script. Latinis non Ecclesiast.</hi> Tom. 1. p. 171.</note>, is ranged under the seventh +book:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Hocce locutus vocat, quicum bene sæpe libenter</q></l> +<l>Mensam, sermonesque suos, rerumque suarum</l> +<pb n="84"/><anchor id="Pg084"/><l>Comiter impertit; magna quum lapsa dies jam</l> +<l>Parte fuisset de parvis summisque gerendis,</l> +<l>Consilio, induforo lato, sanctoque senatu;</l> +<l>Cui res audacter magnas, parvasque, jocumque</l> +<l>Eloqueret, quæ tincta maleis, et quæ bona dictu</l> +<l>Evomeret, si quid vellet, tutoque locaret.</l> +<l>Quocum multa volup ac gaudia clamque palamque.</l> +<l>Ingenium cui nulla malum sententia suadet,</l> +<l>Ut faceret facinus; lenis tamen, haud malus; idem</l> +<l>Doctus, fidelis, suavis homo, facundus, suoque</l> +<l>Contentus, scitus, atque beatus, secunda loquens in</l> +<l>Tempore commodus, et verborum vir paucorum.</l> +<l>Multa tenens antiqua sepulta, et sæpe vetustas</l> +<l>Quæ facit, et mores veteresque novosque tenentem</l> +<l>Multorum veterum leges, divumque hominumque</l> +<l>Prudentem, qui multa loquive, tacereve possit.</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Hunc inter pugnas compellat Servilius sic<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">His friend he called—who at his table fared,</q></l> + <l>And all his counsels and his converse shared;</l> + <l>With whom he oft consumed the day’s decline</l> + <l>In talk of petty schemes, or great design,—</l> + <l>To him, with ease and freedom uncontrouled,</l> + <l>His jests and thoughts, or good or ill, were told:</l> + <l>Whate’er concerned his fortunes was disclosed,</l> + <l>And safely in that faithful breast reposed.</l> + <l>This chosen friend possessed a stedfast mind,</l> + <l>Where no base purpose could its harbour find;</l> + <l>Mild, courteous, learned, with knowledge blest, and sense;</l> + <l>A soul serene, contentment, eloquence;</l> + <l>Fluent in words or sparing, well he knew</l> + <l>All things to speak in place and season due;</l> + <l>His mind was amply graced with ancient lore,</l> + <l>Nor less enriched with modern wisdom’s store:</l> + <l>Him, while the tide of battle onward pressed,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Servilius called, and in these words addressed.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +The eighth and ninth books of these Annals, which are much +mutilated, detailed the events of the second Carthaginian war +in Italy and Africa. This was by much the most interesting +part of the copious subject which Ennius had chosen, and a +portion of it on which he would probably exert all the force of +his genius, in order the more to honour his friend and patron +Scipio Africanus. The same topic was selected by Silius +Italicus, and by Petrarch for his Latin poem <hi rend="italic">Africa</hi>, which obtained +him a coronation in the Capitol. <q>Ennius,</q> says the +illustrious Italian, <q>has sung fully of Scipio; but, in the opinion +of Valerius Maximus, his style is harsh and vulgar, and +there is yet no elegant poem which has for its subject the glorious +exploits of the conqueror of Hannibal.</q> None of the +poets who have chosen this topic, have done full justice to +the most arduous struggle in which two powerful nations had +ever engaged, and which presented the most splendid display +of military genius on the one hand, and heroic virtue on the +other, that had yet been exhibited to the world. Livy’s histo<pb n="85"/><anchor id="Pg085"/>rical account of the second Punic war possesses more real +poetry than any poem on the subject whatever. +</p> + +<p> +The tenth, eleventh, and twelfth books of the Annals of +Ennius, contained the war with Philip of Macedon. In the +commencement of the thirteenth, Hannibal excites Antiochus +to a war against the Romans. In the fourteenth book, the +Consul Scipio, in the prosecution of this contest, arrives at +Ilium, which he thus apostrophizes: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">O patria! O divûm domus Ilium, et incluta bello</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Pergama!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Several Latin writers extol the elegant lines of Ennius immediately +following, in which the Roman soldiers, alluding to its +magnificent revival in Rome, exclaim with enthusiasm, that +Ilium could not be destroyed; +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quai neque Dardaneeis campeis potuere perire,</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Nec quom capta capei, nec quom combusta cremari<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Sacked, but not captive,—burned, yet not consumed;</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Nor on the Dardan plains to moulder doomed.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +a passage which has been closely imitated in the seventh book +of Virgil: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 6"><q rend="post: none">Num Sigeis occumbere campis,</q></l> +<l>Num capti potuere capi: num incensa cremavit</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Troja viros?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The fifteenth book related the expedition of Fulvius Nobilior +to Ætolia, which Ennius himself is said to have accompanied. +In the two following books he prosecuted the Istrian +war; which concludes with the following animated description +of a single hero withstanding the attack of an armed host:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Undique conveniunt, velut imber, tela Tribuno.</q></l> +<l>Configunt parmam, tinnit hastilibus umbo,</l> +<l>Æratæ sonitant galeæ: sed nec pote quisquam</l> +<l>Undique nitendo corpus discerpere ferro.</l> +<l>Semper abundanteis hastas frangitque, quatitque;</l> +<l>Totum sudor habet corpus, moltumque laborat;</l> +<l>Nec respirandi fit copia præpete ferro.</l> +<l>Istrei tela manu jacientes sollicitabant.</l> +<l>Occumbunt moltei leto, ferroque lapique,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Aut intra moeros, aut extra præcipi casu<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">From every side the javelins as a shower</q></l> + <l>Rush, and unerring on the Tribune pour;</l> + <l>Struck by the spears his helm and shield resound,</l> + <l>Though pierced his shield, no shaft inflicts a wound.</l> + <l>Their missile darts th’ embattled Istrians throw,</l> + <l>But all are hurled in vain against their foe;</l> + <l>He pants, and sweats, and labours o’er the field,</l> + <l>The flying shafts no pause for breathing yield;</l> + <l>Smote by his sword or sling, th’ assailants fall</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Within, or headlong thrust beyond the wall.</q></l> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="86"/><anchor id="Pg086"/> + +<p> +The concluding, or eighteenth, book seems to have been in +a great measure personal to the poet himself. It explains his +motive for writing:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q>Omnes mortales sese laudarier optant;</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and he seemingly compares himself to a Courser, who rests +after his triumphs in the Olympic games:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Sic ut fortis Equus, spatio qui sæpe supremo</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Vicit Olumpiaco, nunc senio confectus quiescit<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Even as the generous Steed, whose youthful force</q></l> + <l>Was oft victorious in th’ Olympic course,</l> + <l>Unfit, from age, to triumph in such fields,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">At length to rest his time-worn members yields.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Connected with his Annals, there was a poem of Ennius +devoted to the celebration of the exploits of Scipio, in which +occurs a much-admired description of the calm of Evening, +where the flow of the versification is finely modulated to the +still and solemn imagery:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Mundus cœli vastus constitit silentio,</q></l> +<l>Et Neptunus sævus undeis aspereis pausam dedit:</l> +<l>Sol equeis iter repressit unguleis volantibus,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Constitere amneis perenneis—arbores vento vacant<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">O’er Heaven’s wide arch a solemn silence reigned,</q></l> + <l>And the fierce Ocean his wild waves restrained:</l> + <l>The Sun repressed his steeds’ impetuous force;</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">The winds were hushed; the streams all stayed their course.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +With this first attempt at descriptive poetry in the Latin language, +it may be interesting to compare a passage produced +in the extreme old age of Roman literature, which also paints, +by nearly the same images, the profound repose of Nature:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Tacet omne pecus, volucresque feræque,</q></l> +<l>Et simulant fessos curvata cacumina somnos;</l> +<l>Nec trucibus fluviis idem sonus; occidit horror</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Æquoris, et terris maria acclinata quiescunt.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Horace, in one of his odes, strongly expresses the glory and +honour which the Calabrian muse of Ennius had conferred on +Scipio by this poem, devoted to his praise: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Non incendia Carthaginis impiæ,</q></l> +<l>Ejus qui domita nomen ab Africa</l> +<!-- poem --> +<pb n="87"/><anchor id="Pg087"/><l>Lucratus rediit, clarius indicant</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Laudes quam Calabræ Pierides<note place="foot">Lib. IV. Ode 8.</note>.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +The historical poems of Ennius appear to have been written +without the introduction of much machinery or decorative fiction; +and whether founded on ancient ballads, according to + one opinion<note place="foot">Niebuhr, <hi rend="italic">Romische Geschichte</hi>.</note>, or framed conformably to historical truth, according + to another<note place="foot">Vossius, <hi rend="italic">de Historicis Latinis</hi>, Lib. I. c. 2.</note>, they were obviously deficient in those +embellishments of imagination which form the distinction between +a poem and a metrical chronicle. In the subject which +he had chosen, Ennius wanted the poetic advantages of distance +in place or of time. It perhaps matters little whether +the ground-work of a heroic poem be historical or entirely +fictitious, if free scope be given for the excursions of fancy. +But, in order that it may sport with advantage, the event must +be remote in time or in place; and if this rule be observed, +such subjects as those chosen by Camoens or Tasso admit of +as much colouring and embellishment as the <hi rend="italic">Faery Queen</hi>. It +is in this that Lucan and Voltaire have erred; and neither the +soaring genius of the one, nor brilliancy of the other, could +raise their themes, splendid as they were, from the dust, or +steep the mind in those reveries in which we indulge on subjects +where there is no visible or known bound to credulity +and imaginings. Still the Annals of Ennius, as a national +work, were highly gratifying to a proud ambitious people, and, +in consequence, continued long popular at Rome. They were +highly relished in the age of Horace and Virgil; and, as far +down as the time of Marcus Aurelius, they were recited in +theatres and other public places for the amusement of the + people<note place="foot">Au. <anchor id="corr087"/><corr sic="Gelius">Gellius</corr>, <hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. XVIII. c. 5.</note>. The Romans, indeed, were so formed on his style, +that Seneca called them <hi rend="italic">populus Ennianus</hi>—an Ennian race,—and +said, that both Cicero and Virgil were obliged, contrary +to their own judgment, to employ antiquated terms, in + compliance with the reigning prejudice<note place="foot">Ibid. Lib. XII. c. 2.</note>. From his example, +too, added to the national character, the historical epic became +in future times the great poetical resource of the Romans, +who versified almost every important event in their history. +Besides the <hi rend="italic">Pharsalia</hi> of Lucan, and <hi rend="italic">Punica</hi> of Silius Italicus, +which still survive, there were many works of this description +which are now lost. Varro <anchor id="corr087a"/><corr sic="Attacinus">Atacinus</corr> chose as his subject +Cæsar’s war with the Sequani—Varius, the deeds of Augustus +and Agrippa—Valgius Rufus, the battle of Actium—Albinovanus, +the exploits of Germanicus—Cicero, those of Marius, +and the events of his own consulship. +</p> + +<pb n="88"/><anchor id="Pg088"/> + +<p> +We have already seen Ennius’s imitation of the Greeks in +his tragedies and satires; and even in the above-mentioned +historical poems, though devoted to the celebration of Roman +heroes and subjects exclusively national, he has borrowed +copiously from the Greek poets, and has often made his Roman +consuls fight over again the Homeric battles. Thus the description +of the combat of Ajax, in the 16th Book of the Iliad, +beginning <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Αιας δ’ ουκετ’ ἐμιμνε</foreign><!--[Greek: Aias d'ouket' emimne]-->, has suggested a passage, above +quoted, from the fragments of the Istrian war; and the picture +of a steed breaking from his stall, and ranging the pastures, +is imitated from a similar description, in the 6th Book of the +Iliad— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Et tunc sicut Equus, qui de præsepibus actus,</q></l> +<l>Vincla sua magneis animeis abrumpit, et inde</l> +<l>Fert sese campi per cœrula, lætaque prata;</l> +<l>Celso pectore, sæpe jubam quassat simul altam:</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Spiritus ex animâ calidâ spumas agit albas<note place="foot"><lg> + <l><q rend="post: none"><anchor id="corr088"/><corr sic="without quote">Even</corr> as the generous steed, with reins unbound,</q></l> + <l>Bursts from the stall, and scours along the ground,</l> + <l>With lofty chest he seeks the joyous plain,</l> + <l>And oft, exulting, shakes his crested mane;</l> + <l>The fiery spirit in his breast prevails,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">And the warm heart in sprinkling foam exhales.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Homer’s lines are the following:— +</p> + +<lg> +<l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὡς δ’ ὁτε τις στατος ἱππος, ακοςησας επι φατνῃ</foreign><!--[Greek: Hôs d' hote tis statos hippos, akostêsas epi phatnê--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Δεσμον απορρηξας θειει πεδιοιο κροαινων,</foreign><!--Desmon aporrêxas theiei pedioio kroainôn,--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἐιωθως λουεσθαι εὐρρειος ποταμοιο,</foreign><!--Eiôthôs louesthai eurreios potamoio,--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Κυδιοων· ὑψου δε καρη ἐχει, αμφι δε χαιται</foreign><!--Kydioôn; hypsou de karê echei, amphi de chaitai--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὡμοις αισσονται. ὁ δ’ αγλαιηφι πεποιθως,</foreign><!--Ômois aissontai. ho d' aglaiêphi pepoithôs,--></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ριμφα ἑ γουνα φερει μετα τ’ ἠθεα και νομον ιππων</foreign><!--Rhimpha he gouna pherei meta t' êthea kai nomon hippôn]--><note place="foot">Iliad, Lib. VI. v. 506.</note>.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +In order to afford an opportunity of judging of Ennius’s talents +for imitation, I have subjoined from the two poets, who carried +that art to the greatest perfection, corresponding passages, +which are both evidently founded on the same Greek original— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Qualis, ubi abruptis fugit præsepia vinclis,</q></l> +<l>Tandem liber, Equus, campoque potitus aperto;</l> +<l>Aut ille in pastus armentaque tendit equarum,</l> +<l>Aut, assuetus aquæ perfundi flumine noto,</l> +<l>Emicat, arrectisque fremit cervicibus alte</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Luxurians; luduntque jubæ per colla, per armos<note place="foot">Æneid, Lib. XI.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The other parallel passage is in Tasso’s Jerusalem Delivered— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Come Destrier, che dalle reggie stalle,</q></l> +<l>Ove al uso dell’ arme si riserba,</l> +<pb n="89"/><anchor id="Pg089"/><l>Fugge, e libero alfin, per largo calle</l> +<l>Va tra gli armenti, o al fiume usato, o all’ erba;</l> +<l>Scherzan sul collo i crini, e sulle spalle:</l> +<l>Si scuote la cervice alta e superba:</l> +<l>Suonano i pie nel corso, e par ch’avvampi,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Di sonori nitriti empiendo i campi<note place="foot">C. ix. st. 75.</note>.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +To these parallel passages may be added a very similar, +though perhaps not a borrowed description, from the earliest +production of the most original of all poets, in which the +horse of Adonis breaks loose during the dalliance of Venus +with his master:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="post: none">The strong-necked steed, being tied unto a tree,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Breaketh his rein, and to her straight goes he.</l> +<l>Imperiously he leaps, he neighs, he bounds,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">And now his woven girts he breaks asunder,</l> +<l>The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Whose hollow womb resounds like heaven’s thunder.</l> +<l>His ears up-prick’d, his braided hanging mane,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Upon his compass’d crest, now stands an end;</l> +<l>His nostrils drink the air, and forth again,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">As from a furnace, vapours doth he send.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">His eye which glisters scornfully, like fire,</l> + <l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="pre: none">Shows his hot courage and his high desire<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Venus and Adonis</hi>, p. 13. Shakespeare’s Poems, Ed. 1773.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The poem of Ennius, entitled <hi rend="italic">Phagetica</hi>, is curious,—as +one would hardly suppose, that in this early age, luxury had +made such progress, that the culinary art should have been +systematically or poetically treated. All that we know, however, +of the manner in which it was prepared or served up, is +from the <hi rend="italic">Apologia</hi> of Apuleius. It was, which its name imports, +a didactic poem on eatables, particularly fish, as Apuleius +testifies.—<q>Q. Ennii <hi rend="italic">edes</hi> phagetica, quæ versibus +scripsit, innumerabilia piscium genera enumerat, quæ scilicet +curiose cognorat.</q> It is well known, that previous to the +time of Ennius, this subject had been discussed both in prose + and verse by various Greek authors<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Voyage d’Anacharsis</hi>. T. II. c. 25.</note>, and was particularly +detailed in the poem of Archestratus the Epicurean— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 8"><q rend="post: none">—— The bard</q></l> +<l>Who sang of poultry, venison, and lard,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Poet and cook ——</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It appears from the following passage of Apuleius, that the +work of Ennius was a digest of all the previous books on this +subject,—<q>Alios etiam multis versibus decoravit, et ubi gentium +quisque eorum inveniatur, ostendit qualiter assus, aut +jussulentus optime sapiat; nec tamen ab eruditis reprehendi<pb n="90"/><anchor id="Pg090"/>tur.</q> The eleven lines which remain, and which have been +preserved by Apuleius, mention the places where different +sorts of fish are found in greatest perfection and abundance— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Brundusii Sargus bonus est; hunc, magnus erit si,</q></l> +<l>Sume: Apriclum piscem scite, primum esse Tarenti;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Surrentei fac emas <anchor id="corr090"/><corr sic="(quote missing)">Glaucum,</corr></q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Another poem of Ennius, entitled <hi rend="italic">Epicharmus</hi>, was so called +because it was translated from the Greek work of Epicharmus, +the Pythagorean, on the Nature of Things, in the same manner +as Plato gave the name of <hi rend="italic">Timæus</hi> to the book which he +translated from Timæus the Locrian. This was the same +Epicharmus who invented Greek comedy, and resided in the +court of Hiero of Syracuse. The fragments of this work of +Ennius are so broken and corrupted, that it is impossible to +follow the plan of his poem, or to discover the system of philosophy +which it inculcated. It appears, however, to have +contained many speculations concerning the elements of which +the world was primarily composed, and which, according to + him, were water, earth, air, and fire<note place="foot">Varro, <hi rend="italic">De Re Rustica</hi>, Lib. I. c. 4. Ed. Gesner.</note>; as also with regard to +the preservative powers of nature. Jupiter seems merely to +have been considered by him as the air, the clouds, and the +storm: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Isteic is est Jupiter, quem dico, Græci vocant</q></l> +<l>Aera; quique ventus est, et nubes, imber postea,</l> +<l>Atque ex imbre frigus; ventus post fit, aer denuo:</l> +<l>Istæc propter Jupiter sunt ista, quæ dico tibei,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Qui mortales urbeis, atque belluas omneis juvat<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l>This is the Jupiter whom all revere,</l> + <l>Whom I name Jupiter, and Greeks call Air:</l> + <l>He also is the Wind, the Clouds, the Rain;</l> + <l>Cold, after Showers, then Wind and Air again:</l> + <l>All these are Jove, who social life maintains,</l> + <l>And the huge monsters of the wild sustains.</l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This system, which had been previously adopted by the Etruscans, +and had been promulgated in some of the Orphic hymns, +nearly corresponds with that announced by Cato, in Lucan’s +<hi rend="italic">Pharsalia</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Jupiter est quodcunque vides, quocunque moveris;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and is not far different from the Spinozism, in Pope’s Essay +on Man— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze,</q></l> +<l>Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees;</l> +<pb n="91"/><anchor id="Pg091"/><l>Lives through all life, extends through all extent,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Spreads undivided, operates unspent.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +Ennius, however, whose compositions thus appear to have +been formed entirely on Greek originals, has not more availed +himself of these writings than Virgil has profited by the works +of Ennius. The prince of Latin Poets has often imitated long +passages, and sometimes copied whole lines, from the Father +of Roman Song. This has been shown, in a close comparison, + by Macrobius, in his <hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi><note place="foot">Lib. VI. c. 1. & 2.</note>. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ennius</hi>, Book 1.</l> +<l><q>Qui cœlum versat stellis fulgentibus aptum.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Virgil</hi>, Book 6.</l> +<l><q>Axem humero torquet stellis ardentibus aptum.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ennius</hi>, 1.</l> +<l><q>Est locus Hesperiam quam mortales perhibebant.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Virgil</hi>, 1.</l> +<l><q>Est locus Hesperiam Graii cognomine dicunt.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ennius</hi>, 12.</l> +<l><q rend="post: none">Unus homo nobis cunctando restituit rem;</q></l> +<l>Non ponebat enim rumores ante salutem.</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Ergo postque magisque viri nunc gloria claret<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">He first restored the state by wise delay,</q></l> + <l>Heedless of what a censuring world might say;</l> + <l>Hence time has hallow’d his immortal name,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">And, as the years succeed, still spreads his fame.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg> + The line of Ennius, <q>Unus homo,</q> &c. was applied, with an alteration of the word + <hi rend="italic">cunctando</hi> into <hi rend="italic">vigilando</hi>, by Augustus, in a complimentary letter to Tiberius, on + his good conduct in restoring affairs in Germany, after the unfortunate defeat of + Varus. (Sueton. <hi rend="italic">in Tiberio</hi>. c. 21.)</note>.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Virgil</hi>, 6.</l> +<l><q>Unus qui nobis cunctando restituis rem.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ennius</hi><anchor id="corr091"/><corr sic=".">, 5.</corr></l> +<l><q>Quod per amœnam urbem leni fluit agmine flumen.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Virgil</hi>, 2.</l> +<l><q>Inter opima virum leni fluit agmine Tybris.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ennius</hi>, 1.</l> +<l><q>Hei mihi qualis erat quantum mutatus ab illo.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Virgil</hi>, 2.</l> +<l><q>Hei mihi qualis erat! quantum mutatus ab illo.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ennius</hi>.</l> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Postquam discordia tetra</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Belli ferratos postes portasque refregit<note place="foot">It is of these two lines of Ennius that Horace says, the <hi rend="italic">disjecta membra poetæ</hi>, + that is, the poetical force and spirit, would remain, though the arrangement of the + words were changed, and the measure of the verse destroyed; which, he admits, + would not be the case with his own satires, or those of Lucilius.</note>.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:8"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Virgil</hi>, 7.</l> +<l><q rend="post: none">Impulit ipsa manu portas, et cardine verso</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Belli ferratos rupit Saturnia postes.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +<pb n="92"/><anchor id="Pg092"/> + +<p> +In the longer passages, Virgil has not merely selected the +happiest thoughts and expressions of his predecessor, but in +borrowing a great deal from Ennius, he has added much of +his own. He has thrown on common images new lights of +fancy; he has struck out the finest ideas from ordinary sentiments, +and expunged all puerile conceits and absurdities. +</p> + +<p> +Lucretius and Ovid have also frequently availed themselves +of the works of Ennius. His description of felling the trees +of a forest, in order to fit out a fleet against the Carthaginians, +in the seventh book, has been imitated by Statius in the tenth +book of the <hi rend="italic">Thebaid</hi>. The passage in his sixth satire, in which +he has painted the happy situation of a parasite, compared +with that of the master of a feast, is copied in Terence’s + Phormio<note place="foot">Act. II. sc. 2.</note>. The following beautiful lines have been imitated +by innumerable poets, both ancient and modern: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Jupiter hic risit, tempestatesque serenæ</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Riserunt omnes risu Jovis omnipotentis<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">The Olympian Father smiled; and for a while</q></l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Nature’s calmed elements returned the smile.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Near the commencement of his <hi rend="italic">Annals</hi>, Ennius says, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Audire est operæ pretium, procedere recte</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Qui rem Romanam Latiumque augescere vultis;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +which solemn passage has been parodied by Horace, in the +second satire of the first book: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Audire est operæ pretium, procedere recte</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Qui mœchis non vultis, ut omni parte laborent.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Thus it appears that Ennius occasionally produced verses +of considerable harmony and beauty, and that his conceptions +were frequently expressed with energy and spirit. It must be +recollected, however, that the lines imitated by Virgil, and +the other passages which have been here extracted from the +works of Ennius, are very favourable specimens of his taste +and genius. Sometimes poems, which have themselves been +lost, and of which only fragments are preserved, in the citations +of contemporary or succeeding authors, are now believed +to have been finer productions than they perhaps actually +were. It is the best passages which are quoted, and imitated, +and are thus upborne on the tide of ages, while the grosser +parts have sunk and perished in the flood. We are in this +manner led to form an undue estimate of the excellence of +<pb n="93"/><anchor id="Pg093"/>the whole, in the same manner as we doubtless conceive an +exaggerated idea of the ancient magnificence of Persepolis or +Palmyra, where, while the humble dwellings have mouldered +into dust, the temples and pyramids remain, and all that meets +the eye is towering and majestic. A few, however, even of +the verses of Ennius which have been preserved, are very +harsh, and defective in their mechanical construction; others +are exceedingly prosaic, as, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Egregie cordatus homo Catus Ælius Sextus;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and not a few are deformed with the most absurd conceits, +not so much in the idea, as in a jingle of words and extravagant +alliteration. The ambiguity of the celebrated verse, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Aio te Æacida Romanos vincere posse,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +may be excused as oracular, but what can be said for such +lines as, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Haud doctis dictis certantes sed maledictis.</q></l> +<l>O Tite tute Tate tibi tanta tyranne tulisti.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Stultus est qui cupida cupiens cupienter cupit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This species of conceit was rejected by the good taste of subsequent +Latin poets, even in the most degraded periods of +literature; and I know no parallel to it, except in some passages +of Sidney’s Arcadia. Nothing can be a greater mistake, +than to suppose that false taste and jingle are peculiar to the +latter ages of poetry, and that the early bards of a country +are free from <hi rend="italic">concetti</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +On the whole, the works of Ennius are rather pleasing and +interesting, as the early blossoms of that poetry which afterwards +opened to such perfection, than estimable from their +own intrinsic beauty. To many critics the latter part of Ovid’s +observation, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ennius ingenio maximus—arte rudis,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +has appeared better founded than the first. Scaliger, however, +has termed him, <q>Poeta antiquus magnifico ingenio: Utinam +hunc haberemus integrum, et amisissemus Lucanum, Statium, + Silium Italicum, <hi rend="italic">et tous ces garcons la</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Scaligerana</hi>, p. 136. Ed. Cologne, 1695.</note>.</q> Quintilian has +happily enough compared the writings of Ennius to those +sacred groves hallowed by their antiquity, and which we do +not so much admire for their beauty, as revere with religious +<pb n="94"/><anchor id="Pg094"/>awe and dread<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Institut. Orat.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1.</note>. Hence, if we cannot allow Ennius to be +crowned with the poetical laurel, we may at least grant the +privilege conceded to him by Propertius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ennius hirsutâ cingat sua tempora quercu.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Politian, in his <hi rend="italic">Nutricia</hi>, has recapitulated the events of the +life of Ennius, and has given perhaps the most faithful summary +of his character, both as a man and a poet— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Bella horrenda tonat Romanorumque triumphos,</q></l> +<l>Inque vicem nexos per carmina degerit annos:</l> +<l>Arte rudis, sed mente potens, parcissimus oris,</l> +<l>Pauper opum, fidens animi, morumque probatus,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Contentusque suo, nec bello ignarus et armis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But whatever may have been the merits of the works of Ennius, +of which we are now but incompetent judges, they were at +least sufficiently various. Epic, dramatic, satiric, and didactic +poetry, were all successively attempted by him; and we also +learn that he exercised himself in lighter sorts of verse, as the + epigram and acrostic<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">De Divinatione</hi>, Lib. II. c. 54.</note>. For this novelty and exuberance it is +not difficult to account. The fountains of Greek literature, as +yet untasted in Latium, were to him inexhaustible sources. +He stood in very different circumstances from those Greek +bards who had to rely solely on their own genius, or from his +successors in Latin poetry, who wrote after the best productions +of Greece had become familiar to the Romans. He was +placed in a situation in which he could enjoy all the popularity +and applause due to originality, without undergoing the labour +of invention, and might rapidly run with success through every +mode of the lyre, without possessing incredible diversity of +genius. +</p> + +<p> +The above criticisms apply to the poetical productions of +Ennius; but the most curious point connected with his literary +history is his prose translation of the celebrated work of +Euhemerus, entitled, <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἱερα Αναγραφη</foreign><!--[Greek: Hiera Anagraphê]-->. Euhemerus is generally +supposed to have been an inhabitant of Messene, a city of +Peloponnesus. Being sent, as he represented, on a voyage of +discovery by Cassander, King of Macedon, he came to an +island called Panchaia, in the capital of which, Panara, he +found a temple of the Tryphilian Jupiter, where stood a column +inscribed with a register of the births and deaths of many +of the gods. Among these, he specified Uranus, his sons Pan +and Saturn, and his daughters Rhea and Ceres; as also Jupiter, +Juno, and Neptune, who were the offspring of Saturn. Ac<pb n="95"/><anchor id="Pg095"/>cordingly, the design of Euhemerus was to show, by investigating +their actions, and recording the places of their births +and burials, that the mythological deities were mere mortal +men, raised to the rank of gods on account of the benefits +which they had conferred on mankind,—a system which, according +to Meiners and Warburton, formed the grand secret + revealed at the initiation into the Eleusinian mysteries<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Divine Legation of Moses</hi>.</note>. The +translation by Ennius, as well as the original work, is lost; but +many particulars concerning Euhemerus, and the object of his +history, are mentioned in a fragment of Diodorus Siculus, +preserved by Eusebius. Some passages have also been saved +by St. Augustine; and long quotations, have been made by +Lactantius, in his treatise <hi rend="italic">De Falsa Religione</hi>. These, so far +as they extend, may be regarded as the truest and purest +sources of mythological history, though not much followed in +our modern <hi rend="italic">Pantheons</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +Plutarch, who was associated to the priesthood, and all who +were interested in the support of the vulgar creed, maintained, +that the whole work of Euhemerus, with his voyage to Panchaia, +was an impudent fiction; and, in particular, it was +urged, that no one except Euhemerus had ever seen or heard + of the land of Panchaia<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Iside et Osiride</hi>.</note>: that the Panchaia Tellus had +indeed been described in a flowery and poetical style, both by +Diodorus Siculus and Virgil— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q>Totaque thuriferis Panchaia pinguis arenis<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Georg.</hi> Lib. II. v. 139.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +but not in such a manner as to determine its geographical +position. +</p> + +<p> +The truth, however, of the relation contained in the work +of Euhemerus, has been vindicated by modern writers; who +have attempted to prove that Panchaia was an island of the +Red Sea, which Euhemerus had actually visited in the course + of his voyage<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Mem. de l’Acad. des Inscriptions</hi>, Tom. XV.</note>. But whether Euhemerus merely recorded +what he had seen, or whether the whole book was a device +and contrivance of his own, it seems highly probable that the +translation of Ennius gave rise to the belief of many Roman +philosophers, who maintained, or insinuated, their conviction +of the mortality of the gods, and whose writings have been so +frequently appealed to by Farmer, in his able disquisition on +the prevalence of the Worship of Human Spirits. +</p> + +<p> +It is clear, that notwithstanding their observance of prodigies +and religious ceremonies, there prevailed a considerable +spirit of free-thinking among the Romans in the age of Ennius. +<pb n="96"/><anchor id="Pg096"/>This is apparent, not merely from his translation of Euhemerus, +and definition of the nature of Jupiter, in his <hi rend="italic">Epicharmus</hi>, +but from various passages in dramas adapted for public representation, +which deride the superstitions of augurs and soothsayers, +as well as the false ideas entertained of the worshipped +divinities. Polybius, too, who flourished shortly after Ennius, +speaks of the fear of the gods, and the inventions of augury, +merely as an excellent political engine, at the same time that +he reprehends the rashness and absurdity of those who were + endeavouring to extirpate such useful opinions<note place="foot">Polyb. Lib. V.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The dramatic career which had been commenced by Livius +Andronicus and Ennius, was most successfully prosecuted by +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Plautus"/><index index="pdf" level1="Plautus"/> +<head>PLAUTUS,</head> + +<p> +who availed himself, still more even than his predecessors, of +the works of the Greeks. The Old Greek comedy was excessively +satirical, and sometimes obscene. Its subjects, as is +well known, were not entirely fictitious, but in a great measure +real; and neither the highest station, nor the brightest talents, +were any security against the unrestrained invectives of the +comic muse in her earliest sallies. Cratinus, Eupolis, and +Aristophanes, were permitted to introduce on the stage the +philosophers, generals, and magistrates of the state with their +true countenances, and as it were in <hi rend="italic">propria persona</hi>; a license +which seems, in some measure, to have been regarded as the +badge of popular freedom. It is only from the plays of Aristophanes +that we can judge of the spirit of the ancient comedy. +Its genius was so wild and strange, that it scarcely admits of +definition: and can hardly be otherwise described, than as +containing a great deal of allegorical satire on the political +measures and manners of the Athenians, and parodies on their +tragic poets. +</p> + +<p> +When in Athens the people began to lose their political +influence, and when the management of their affairs was vested +in fewer hands than formerly, the oligarchical government +restrained this excessive license; but while the poets were +prohibited from naming the individuals whose actions they +exposed, still they represented real characters so justly, though +under fictitious appellations, that there could be no mistake +with regard to the persons intended. This species of drama, +which <anchor id="corr096"/><corr sic="conprehends">comprehends</corr> some of the later pieces of Aristophanes,—for +example, his Plutus,—and is named the Middle comedy, +<pb n="97"/><anchor id="Pg097"/>was soon discovered to be as offensive and dangerous as the +old. The dramatists being thus at length forced to invent +their subjects and characters, comedy became a general yet +lively imitation of the common actions of life. All personal +allusion was dropped, and the Chorus, which had been the +great vehicle of censure and satire, was removed. The new +comedy was thus so different in its features from the middle +or the old, that Schlegel has been induced to think, that it +was formed on the model of the latest tragedians, rather than + on the ancient comedy<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Cours de Litterature Dramatique</hi>, Tom. I.</note>. In the productions of Agathon, and +even in some dramas of Euripides, tragedy had descended +from its primeval height, and represented the distresses of +domestic life, though still the domestic life of kings and +heroes. Though Euripides was justly styled by Aristotle the +most tragic of all poets, his style possessed neither the energy +and sublimity of Æschylus, nor the gravity and stateliness of +Sophocles, and it was frequently not much elevated above the +language of ordinary conversation. His plots, too, like the +<hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi> of Plautus, often hinge on the fear of women, lest +they be torn from the shrines or altars to which they had fled +for protection; and what may be regarded as a confirmation +of this opinion is, that Euripides, who had been so severely +satirized by Aristophanes, was extravagantly extolled by Philemon, +in his own age the most popular writer of the new +comedy. +</p> + +<p> +While possessing, perhaps, both less art and fire than the +old satirical drama, produced in times of greater public freedom, +the new comedy is generally reputed to have been superior +in delicacy, regularity, and decorum. But although it +represented the characters and manners of real life, yet in +these characters and manners—to judge at least from the +fragments which remain, and from the Latin imitations—there +does not appear to have been much variety. There is always +an old father, a lover, and a courtezan; as if formed on each +other, like the Platonic and licentious lover in the Spanish +romances of chivalry. <q>Their plots,</q> says Dryden, <q>were +commonly a little girl, stolen or wandering from her parents, +brought back unknown to the city,—there got with child by +some one, who, by the help of his servant, cheats his father,—and +when her time comes to cry Juno Lucina, one or other +sees a little box or cabinet which was carried away with her, +and so discovers her to her friends;—if some god do not prevent +it, by coming down in a machine, and taking the thanks +of it to himself. By the plot you may guess much of the cha<pb n="98"/><anchor id="Pg098"/>racters of the persons; an old father, who would willingly +before he dies see his son well married; a debauched son, +kind in his nature to his mistress, but miserably in want of +money; and a servant, or slave, who has so much art as to +strike in with him, and help to dupe his father; a braggadocio +captain; a parasite; a lady of pleasure. As for the poor +honest maid, on whom the story is built, and who ought to be +one of the principal actors in the play, she is commonly mute +in it. She has the breeding of the old Elizabeth way: which +was, for maids to be seen and not to be heard.</q> Sometimes, +however, her breeding appears in being heard and not seen; +and Donatus remarks, that invocations of Juno behind the +scenes were the only way in which the <hi rend="italic">severity</hi> of the <hi rend="italic">Comœdia +palliata</hi> allowed young gentlewomen to be introduced. +Were we to characterize the ancient drama by appellations of +modern invention, it might be said, that the ancient comedy +was what we call a comedy of character, and the modern a +comedy of intrigue. +</p> + +<p> +Nævius, while inventing plots of his own, had tried to +introduce on the Roman stage the style of the <hi rend="italic">old</hi> Greek comedy; +but his dramas did not succeed, and the fate of their +author deterred others from following his dangerous career. The +government of Athens, which occupies a chief part in the old +comedy, was the most popular of all administrations; and hence +not only oratory but comedy claimed the right of ridiculing and +exposing it. The first state in Greece became the subject of +merriment. In one play, the whole body of the people was +represented under the allegorical personage of an old doting +driveller; and the pleasantry was not only tolerated but enjoyed +by the members of the state itself. Cleon and Lamachus +could not have repressed the satire of Aristophanes, as +the Metelli checked the invectives of Nævius. Under pretence +of patriotic zeal, the Greek comic writers spared no part of the +public conduct,—councils, revenues, popular assemblies, judicial +proceedings, or warlike enterprizes. Such exposure was +a restraint on the ambition of individuals,—a matter of importance +to a people jealous of its liberties. All this, however, +was quite foreign to the more serious taste, and more aristocratic +government, of the Romans, to their estimation of +heroes and statesmen, to their respect for their legitimate +chiefs, and for the dignity even of a Roman citizen. The profound +reverence and proud affection which they entertained +for all that exalted the honour of their country, and their extreme +sensibility to its slightest disgrace, must have interdicted +any exhibition, in which its glory was humbled, or its misfortunes +held up to mockery. They would not have laughed so +<pb n="99"/><anchor id="Pg099"/>heartily at the disasters of a Carthaginian, as the Athenians +did at those of a Peloponnesian or Sicilian war. The disposition +which led them to return thanks to Varro, after the battle +of Cannæ, that he had not despaired of the republic, was +very different from the temper which excited such contumelious +laughter at the promoters of the Spartan war, and the + advisers of the fatal expedition to Syracuse<note place="foot">In this feature of their character the Athenians had a considerable resemblance + to the French, during their most brilliant and courtly era. <q>Comment,</q> said a + French courtier of the age of Louis XIV., on hearing of a good joke which had + been uttered on occasion of a great national calamity;—<q>Comment, ne serait on + charmé des grands evenemens, des bouleversemens mêmes qui font dire de si + jolis mots.</q>—<q>On suivit,</q> says Chamfort, <q>cette idée, on repassa les mots, les + chansons, faites sur tous les desastres de la France. La chanson sur la bataille de + Hochstet fut trouvée mauvaise, et quelques uns dirent à ce sujet: Je suis faché de + la perte de cette bataille; la chanson ne vaut rien.</q>—<hi rend="italic">Maximes, Pensées, &c.</hi> par + Chamfort, p. 190.</note>. When the +Roman people were seriously offended, the Tarpeian rock, +and not the stage, was the spot selected for their vengeance. +</p> + +<p> +Accordingly, Plautus found it most prudent to imitate the +style of the new comedy, which had been brought to perfection, +about half a century before his birth, by Menander. All +his comedies, however, are not strictly formed on this model, +as a few partake of the nature of the middle comedy: not that, +like Nævius, he satirized the senators or consuls; but I have +little doubt that many of his <hi rend="italic">dramatis personæ</hi>, such as the +miser and braggart captain, were originally caricatures of +citizens of Athens. In borrowing from the Greek, he did not, +like modern writers of comedy who wish to conceal their plagiarisms, +vary the names of his characters, the scene of action, +and other external circumstances, while the substance of the +drama remained the same; on the contrary, he preserved every +circumstance which could tend to give his dramatic pieces a +Greek air:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Atque hoc poetæ faciunt in comœdiis;</q></l> +<l>Omnes res gestas esse Athenis autumant,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quo illud vobis Græcum videatur magis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Plautus was the son of a freedman, and was born at Sarsina, +a town in Umbria, about the year 525. He was called Plautus +from his splay feet, a defect common among the Umbrians. +Having turned his attention to the stage, he soon realized a +considerable fortune by the popularity of his dramas; but by +risking it in trade, or spending it, according others, on the +splendid dresses which he wore as an actor, and theatrical +amusements being little resorted to, on account of the famine +then prevailing at Rome, he was quickly reduced to such +<pb n="100"/><anchor id="Pg100"/>necessity as forced him to labour at a hand-mill for his daily + support<note place="foot">Au. Gellius, <hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. III. c. 3.</note> an employment which at Rome, was the ordinary +punishment of a worthless slave. Many of his plays were +written in these unfavourable circumstances, and of course +have not obtained all the perfection which might otherwise +have resulted from his knowledge of life, and his long practice +in the dramatic art. +</p> + +<p> +Of the performances of Plautus, the first, in that alphabetical +order in which, for want of a better, they are usually +arranged, is, +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>.—Personal resemblances are a most fertile +subject of comic incidents, and almost all nations have had +their Amphitryon. The Athenians in particular gladly availed +themselves of this subject, as it afforded an opportunity of +throwing ridicule on the dull Bœotians. It is not certain, however, +from what Greek author the play of Plautus was taken. + Being announced as a tragi-comedy, some critics<note place="foot">Signorelli, <hi rend="italic">Storia di Teatri</hi>. Tom. II. p. 32.</note> have +conjectured that it was most probably imitated from an Amphitryon + mentioned by Athenæus,<note place="foot">Lib. III.</note> which was the work of +Rhinton, a poet of Tarentum, who wrote mock-tragedies and +tragi-comedies styled <hi rend="italic">Rhintonica</hi> or <hi rend="italic">Hilarotragœdiæ</hi>. M. +Schlegel, however, alleges that it was borrowed from a play +of Epicharmus the Sicilian. The subjects indeed of the ancient +Greek comedy, particularly in the hands of Epicharmus, +its inventor, were frequently derived from mythology. Even +in its maturity, these topics were not renounced, as appears +from the titles of several lost pieces of Aristophanes and his +contemporaries. Such fabulous traditions continued sometimes +to occupy the scenes of the middle comedy, and it was +not till the new was introduced that the sphere of the comic +drama was confined to the representation of private and domestic +life. Euripides also is said to have written a play +entitled <hi rend="italic">Alcmena</hi>, on the story of Amphitryon, but how far +Plautus may have been indebted to him for his plot cannot be +now ascertained. It is probable enough, however, that some +of the serious parts may have been copied from the <hi rend="italic">Alcmena</hi> +of Euripides. The catastrophe of Plautus’s <hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi> is +brought about by a storm; and we learn from the <hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi>, +another play of Plautus, that a tempest was introduced by the +Greek tragedian— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Non ventus fuit, verum Alcmena Euripidis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="101"/><anchor id="Pg101"/> + +<p> +The Latin play is introduced by a prologue which is spoken +by the God Mercury, and was explanatory to the audience of +the circumstances preceding the opening of the piece, and the +situation of the principal characters. The term <hi rend="italic">prologue</hi> has +been very arbitrarily used. In one sense it merely signified +the induction to the dramatic action, which informed the +spectator of what was necessary to be known for duly understanding +it. Aristotle calls that part of a tragedy the prologue, + which precedes the first song of the chorus.<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Poet.</hi> XII.</note> In the Greek +tragedies, the prologue was often a long introductory and +narrative monologue. Sophocles, however, so <hi rend="italic">dialogued</hi> this +part of the drama, that it has no appearance of a contrivance +to instruct, but seems a natural conversation of the <hi rend="italic">dramatis +personæ</hi>. Euripides, on the other hand, fell more into the +style of the formal narrative prologue, since, before entering +on the action or dialogue, one of the persons destined to bear +a part in the drama frequently explained to the audience, in +a continued discourse, what things seemed essential for understanding +the piece. Sometimes, however, in the Greek tragedies, +the speaker of this species of prologue is not a person +of the drama. In general, these artificial prologues of explanatory +narration are addressed directly to the spectators, and +hence approach nearly to the prologue, in our acceptation of +the term. The poets of the ancient comedy, as we see from +Aristophanes, usually adopted, like Sophocles, the mode of +explaining preliminary circumstances in the course of the +action, whence it has been considered that the old Greek +comedies have no prologue; and they certainly have none in +the strict modern sense, though the method of Euripides has +been employed to a certain degree in the <hi rend="italic">Wasps</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Birds</hi>, +in the former of which Xanthias, interrupting the dialogue +with Sosias, turns abruptly to the spectators, and unfolds the +argument of the fable. The poets of the middle and new +comedy, while departing from Aristophanes in many things, +followed him in the form of the prologue; and, as they improved +in refinement, interwove still closer the requisite exposition +of the fable with its action. The Romans thus found +among the Greeks, prologues in a continued narrative, <anchor id="corr101"/><corr sic="and and">and</corr> +prologues where the exposition was mixed with the action. +From these models they formed a new species, peculiar to +themselves, which is entirely separated from the action of the +drama, and which generally contains an explanation of circumstances +and characters, with such gentle recommendation +of the piece as suited the purpose of the author. We shall +<pb n="102"/><anchor id="Pg102"/>find that the Latin prologues, dressed up in the form of narrative, +sometimes preceded the dramatic induction of the +action, and at other times, as in the <hi rend="italic">Miles Gloriosus</hi>, followed +it. The prologue of the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> is on the plan adopted +by Aristophanes, and that of the <hi rend="italic">Cistellaria</hi> is conformable to +the practice of our own theatre. To other plays, such as the +<hi rend="italic">Epidicus</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Bacchides</hi>, there were originally no prologues, +but they were prefixed after the death of the author, in order +to explain the reasons for bringing them forward anew. It +thus appears that in his prologues Plautus approached nearer +to Euripides than to those comic writers whom in his argument +and all other respects he chiefly followed. The prologues +of Terence, again, seldom announce the subject. In +the manner of the Greeks, his induction is laid in the first +scene of the play, and the prologues seem chiefly intended to +acknowledge the Greek original of his drama, and to explain +matters personal to himself. They rather resemble the choruses +of Aristophanes, which in the <hi rend="italic">Wasps</hi> and other plays +directly address the audience in favour of the poet, and complain +of the unjust reception which his dramas occasionally +experienced. +</p> + +<p> +In the prologue to the <hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>, Plautus calls his play + a tragi-comedy<note place="foot"><lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Faciam ut commixta sit tragico comœdia;</q></l> + <l>Nam me perpetuo facere ut sit comœdia,</l> + <l>Reges quo veniant et Dii, non par arbitror.</l> + <l>Quid igitur? quoniam hic servus quoque parteis habet,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Faciam sit, proinde ut dixi, tragi-comœdia.</q></l> + <!-- poem --> + </lg></note>; probably not so much that there is any +thing tragical in the subject, (although the character of Alcmena +is a serious one,) as, because it is of that mixed kind in +which the highest as well as lowest characters are introduced. +The plot is chiefly founded on the well-known mythological +incident of Jupiter assuming the figure of Amphitryon, general +of the Thebans, during his absence with the army, and by that +means imposing on his wife Alcmena. The play opens while +Jupiter is supposed to be with the object of his passion. Sosia, +the servant of Amphitryon, who had been sent on before by +his master, from the port to announce his victory and approach, +is introduced on the stage, proceeding towards the palace of +Amphitryon. While expressing his astonishment at the length +of the night, he is met, in front of his master’s house, by +Mercury, who had assumed his form, and who, partly by blows +and threats, and partly by leading him to doubt of his own +identity, succeeds in driving him back. This gives Jupiter +time to prosecute his amour, and he departs at dawn. The +<pb n="103"/><anchor id="Pg103"/>improbable story related by Sosia is not believed by his master, +who himself now advances towards his house, from which +Alcmena comes forth, lamenting the departure of her supposed +husband; but seeing Amphitryon, she expresses her surprise +at his speedy return. The jealousy of Amphitryon is thus +excited, and he quits the stage, in order to bring evidence +that he had never till that time quitted his army. Jupiter then +returns, and Amphitryon is afterwards refused access to his +own house by Mercury, who pretends that he does not know +him. At length Jupiter and Amphitryon are confronted. They +are successively questioned as to the events of the late war by +the pilot of the ship in which Amphitryon had returned. As +Jupiter also stands this test of identity, the real Amphitryon +is wrought up to such a pitch of rage and despair, that he +resolves to wreak vengeance on his whole family, and is provoked +even to utter blasphemies, by setting the gods at defiance. +He is supposed immediately after this to have been +struck down by lightning, as, in the next scene, Bromia, the +attendant of Alcmena, rushes out from the house, alarmed at +the tempest, and finds Amphitryon lying prostrate on the +earth. When he has recovered, she announces to him that +during the storm Alcmena had given birth to twins:— +</p> + +<lg> +<l><q><hi rend="italic">Amph.</hi> Ain’ tu Geminos? <hi rend="italic">Brom.</hi> Geminos. <hi rend="italic">Amph.</hi> Dii me servent.</q> +</l> +</lg> + +<p> +Jupiter then, <hi rend="italic">in propria persona</hi>, reveals the whole mystery, +and Amphitryon appears to be much flattered by the honour +which had been paid him. +</p> + +<p> +In this play the jealousy and perplexity of Amphitryon are +well portrayed, and the whole character of Alcmena is beautifully +drawn. She is represented as an affectionate wife, full +of innocence and simplicity, and her distress at the suspicions +of the real Amphitryon is highly interesting. The English +translator of Plautus has remarked the great similarity of +manners between her and Desdemona, while placed in similar +circumstances. Both express indignation at being suspected, +but love for their husbands makes them easily reconciled. The +reader, however, feels that Amphitryon and Alcmena remain +in an awkward situation at the conclusion of the piece. It +must also be confessed, that the Roman dramatist has assigned +a strange part to Jupiter Optimus Maximus, at whose +festivals this play is said to have been usually performed; but, +as Voltaire has remarked, <q>Il n’y a que ceux qui ne savent +point combien les hommes agissent peu consequemment, qui +puissent etre surpris, qu’on se moqua publiquement au theatre +des memes dieux qu’on adorait dans les temples.</q> +</p> + +<pb n="104"/><anchor id="Pg104"/> + +<p> +Mistakes are a most fruitful subject of comic incident, and +never could there be such mistakes as those which arise from +two persons being undistinguishable: but then, in order to +give an appearance of verisimilitude on the stage, it was +almost necessary that the play should be represented with +masks, which could alone exhibit the perfect resemblance of +the two Amphitryons and the two Sosias; and even with this +advantage, such errors, in order to possess dramatic plausibility, +must have been founded on some mythological tradition. +The subject, therefore, is but an indifferent one for +the modern stage. Accordingly, Ludovico Dolce, who first +imitated this comedy in his play entitled <hi rend="italic">Marito</hi>, has grossly +erred in transporting the scene from Thebes to Padua, and +assigning the parts of Jupiter and Amphitryon to Messer +Muzio and Fabrizio, two Italian citizens, who were so similar +in appearance, that the wife of one of them, though a sensible +and virtuous woman, is deceived night and day, during her +husband’s absence, by the resemblance, and the deception is +aided by the still more marvellous likeness of their domestics. +In place of Jupiter appearing in the clouds, and justifying +Alcmena, the Italian has introduced a monk, called Fra Girolamo, +who is bribed to persuade the foolish husband that a +spirit (Folletto) had one night transported him to Padua, during +sleep, which satisfactorily accounts to him for the situation in +which he finds his wife on his return home. +</p> + +<p> +These absurdities have been in a great measure avoided in +the imitation by Rotrou, who may be regarded as the father of +the French drama, having first exploded the bad taste which +pervades the pieces of Hardy. His comedy entitled <hi rend="italic">Les Deux +Sosies</hi>, is completely framed on the Amphitryon of Plautus, +only the prologue is spoken by the inveterate Juno, who declaims +against her rivals, and enumerates the labours which +she has in store for the son of Alcmena. +</p> + +<p> +But by far the most celebrated imitation of Plautus is the +<hi rend="italic">Amphitrion</hi> of Moliere, who has managed with much delicacy +a subject in itself not the most decorous. He has in general +followed the steps of the Roman dramatist, but where he has +departed from them, he has improved on the original. Instead of +the dull and inconsistent prologue delivered by Mercury, which +explains the subject of the piece, he has introduced a scene +between Mercury and Night, (probably suggested by the Dialogues +of Lucian between Mercury and the Sun on the same +occasion,) in which Mercury announces the state of matters +while requesting Night to prolong her stay on earth for the sake +of Jupiter. At the commencement of the piece, Plautus has +made Sosia repeat to himself a very minute, though picturesque +<pb n="105"/><anchor id="Pg105"/>account of the victory of the Thebans, as preparatory to a proper +description of it to Alcmena. This Moliere has formed into +a sort of dialogued soliloquy between Sosia and his Lantern, +which rehearses the answers anticipated from Alcmena, till +the discourse is at length interrupted by the arrival of Mercury, +when the speaker has lost himself among the manœuvres +of the troops. In the Latin <hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>, Mercury threatens +Sosia, and he replies to his rodomontade by puns and quibbles, +which have been omitted by the French poet, who makes +the spectators laugh by the excessive and ridiculous terror of +Sosia, and not by pleasantries inconsistent with his feelings +and situation. Moliere has copied from Plautus the manner +in which Sosia is gradually led to doubt of his own identity: +his consequent confusion of ideas has been closely imitated, +as also the ensuing scenes of the quarrel and reconciliation +between Jupiter and Alcmena. He has added the part of +Cleanthes, the wife of Sosia, suggested to him by a line put +into the mouth of Sosia by Plautus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quid me expectatum non rere amicæ meæ venturum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It was certainly ingenious to make the adventures of the slave +a parody on those of his master, and this new character produces +an agreeable scene between her and Mercury, who is +little pleased with the caresses of this antiquated charmer. +On the other hand, the French dramatist has omitted the +examination of the double Amphitryons, and nearly introduces +them in the presence of two Thebans: Amphitryon brings his +friends to avenge him, by assaulting Jupiter, when that god +appears in the clouds and announces the future birth of Hercules. +Through the whole comedy, Moliere has given a different +colour to the behaviour of Jupiter, from that thrown +over it by Plautus. In the Latin play he assumes quite the +character of the husband; but with Moliere he is more of a +lover and gallant, and pays Alcmena so many amorous compliments, +that she exclaims, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="post: none">Amphitrion, en verité,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vous vous moquez de tenir ce langage!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Moliere evidently felt that Alcmena and Amphitryon were +placed in an awkward situation, in spite of the assurances of +Jupiter— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 3"><q rend="post: none">Alcmene est toute a toi, quelque soin qu’on employe;</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 3">Et ce doit a tes feux etre un objet bien doux,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 3">De voir, que pour lui plaire, il n’est point d’autre voie,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 8">Que de paraitre son epoux.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><hi rend="italic">Sosie</hi>. Le seigneur Jupiter sait dorer sa pilule.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="106"/><anchor id="Pg106"/> + +<p> +In these, and several other lines, Moliere has availed himself +of the old French play of Rotrou. The lively expression of +Sosia, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Le veritable Amphitryon est l’Amphitryon ou l’on dine,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +which has passed into a sort of proverb, has been suggested +by a similar phrase of Rotrou’s Sosia— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Point point d’Amphitryon ou l’on ne dine point;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and the lines, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">J’etais venu, je vous jure,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Avant que je fusse arrivé,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +are nearly copied from Rotrou’s +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>J’etais chez-nous avant mon arrivé;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and Sosia’s boast, in the older French play, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Il m’est conforme en tout—il est grand, il est fort,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +has probably suggested to Moliere the lines, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Des pieds, jusqu’ a la tete il est comme moi fait,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Beau, l’air noble, bienpris, les manieres charmantes.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Amphitrion</hi> of Moliere was published in 1668, so that +Dryden, in his imitation of Plautus’s <hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>, which first +appeared in 1690, had an opportunity of also availing himself +of the French piece. But, even with this assistance, he has +done Plautus less justice than his predecessor. He has sometimes +borrowed the scenes and incidents of Moliere; but has +too frequently given us ribaldry in the low characters, and +bombast in the higher, instead of the admirable grace and +liveliness of the French dramatist. His comedy commences +earlier than either the French or Latin play. Phœbus makes +his appearance at the opening of the piece. The first +arrival of Jupiter in the shape of Amphitryon is then represented, +apparently in order to introduce Phædra, the attendant +of Alcmena, exacting a promise from her mistress, before she +knew, who had arrived, that they should that night be bed-fellows +as usual since Amphitryon’s absence. To this Phædra, +Dryden has assigned an amour with Mercury, to the great +jealousy of Sosia’s wife, Bromia; and has mixed up the whole +play with pastoral dialogues and <hi rend="italic">rondeaus</hi>, to which, as he<pb n="107"/><anchor id="Pg107"/> +informs us in his dedication, <q>the numerous choir of fair +ladies gave so just an applause.</q> The scenes of a higher +description are those which have been best managed. The +latest editor, indeed, of the works of Dryden, thinks that +in these parts he has surpassed both the French and Roman +dramatist. <q>The sensation to be expressed,</q> he remarks, <q>is +not that of sentimental affection, which the good father of +Olympus was not capable of feeling; but love of that grosser +and subordinate kind, which prompted Jupiter in his intrigues, +has been expressed by none of the ancient poets in more +beautiful verse, than that in which Dryden has clothed it, in +the scenes between Jupiter and Alcmena.</q> Milbourne, who +afterwards so violently attacked the English poet, highly compliments +him on the success of this effort of his dramatic +muse— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Not Phœbus could with gentler words pursue</q></l> +<l>His flying Daphne; not the morning dew</l> +<l>Falls softer, than the words of amorous Jove,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">When melting, dying, for Alcmena’s love.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The character, however, of Alcmena is, I think, less interesting +in the English than in the Latin play. She is painted by +Plautus as delighted with the glory of her husband. In the +second scene of the second act, after a beautiful complaint +on account of his absence, she consoles herself with the +thoughts of his military renown, and concludes with an eulogy +on valour, which would doubtless be highly popular in a Roman +theatre during the early ages of the Republic— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Virtus præmium est optimum,</q></l> +<l>Virtus omnibus rebus anteit profecto.</l> +<l>Libertas, salus, vita, res, parenteis,</l> +<l>Patria, et prognati tutantur, servantur:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Virtus omnia in se habet; omnia adsunt bona, quem pen’est virtus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Dryden’s Alcmena is represented as quite different in her +sentiments: She exclaims, on parting with Jupiter, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Curse on this honour, and this public fame!</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Would you had less of both, and more of love!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Lady M. W. Montague gives a curious account, in one of +her letters, of a German play on the subject of Amphitryon, +which she saw acted at Vienna.—<q>As that subject had been +already handled by a Latin, French, and English poet, I was +curious to see what an Austrian author could make of it. I +understand enough of that language to comprehend the greatest +part of it; and, besides, I took with me a lady that had the +<pb n="108"/><anchor id="Pg108"/>goodness to explain to me every word. I thought the house +very low and dark; but the comedy admirably recompensed +that defect. I never laughed so much in my life. It began +with Jupiter falling in love out of a peep-hole in the clouds, +and ended with the birth of Hercules. But what was most +pleasant was, the use Jupiter made of his metamorphosis; for +you no sooner saw him under the figure of Amphitryon, but, +instead of flying to Alcmena with the raptures Dryden puts +into his mouth, he sends for Amphitryon’s tailor, and cheats +him of a laced coat, and his banker of a bag of money—a Jew +of a diamond ring, and bespeaks a great supper in his name; +and the greatest part of the comedy turns upon poor Amphitryon’s +being tormented by these people for their debts. Mercury +uses Sosia in the same manner; but I could not easily +pardon the liberty the poet had taken of larding his play with +not only indecent expressions, but such gross words as I do +not think our mob would suffer from a mountebank.</q> +</p> + +<p> +In nothing can the manners of different ages and countries +be more distinctly traced, than in the way in which the same +subject is treated on the stage. In Plautus, may be remarked +the military enthusiasm and early rudeness of the Romans—in +the <hi rend="italic">Marito</hi> of L. Dolce, the intrigues of the Italians, and +the constant interposition of priests and confessors in domestic +affairs—in Dryden, the libertinism of the reign of Charles +the Second—and in Moliere, the politeness and refinement of +the court of Louis. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Asinaria</hi>, is translated from the Greek of Demophilus, a +writer of the Middle comedy. The subject is the trick put +on an ass-driver by two roguish slaves, in order to get hold +of the money which he brought in payment of some asses he +had purchased from their master, that they might employ it in +supplying the extravagance of their master’s son. The old +man, however, is not the dupe in this play: On the contrary, +he is a confederate in the plot, which was chiefly devised +against his wife, who, having brought her husband a great +portion, imperiously governed his house and family. By this +means the youth is restored to the possession of a mercenary +mistress, from whom he had been excluded by a more wealthy +rival. The father stipulates, as a reward for the part which +he had acted in this stratagem, that he also should have a +share in the favours of his son’s mistress; and the play concludes +with this old wretch being detected by his wife, carousing +at a nocturnal banquet, a wreath of flowers on his +head, with his son and the courtezan. It would appear, from +the concluding address to the spectators, that neither the +moral sense of the author, nor of his audience, was very strong +<pb n="109"/><anchor id="Pg109"/>or correct, as the bystanders on the stage, so far from condemning +these abandoned characters, declare that the most +guilty of the three had done nothing new or surprising, or +more than what was customary: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none"><hi rend="italic">Grex.</hi> Hic senex, si quid, clam uxorem, suo animo fecit volup,</q></l> +<l>Neque novum, neque mirum fecit, nec secus quam alii solent:</l> +<l>Nec quisqua’st tam in genio duro; nec tam firmo pectore,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quin ubi quicquam occasionis sit, sibi faciat bene.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Lucilius, while remarking in one of his fragments, that the +Chremes of Terence had preserved a just medium in morals +by his obliging demeanour towards his son, had ample grounds +for observing, that the Demænetus of Plautus had run into an +extreme— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q>Chremes in medium, in summum ire Ademænetus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. XXVIII.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +However exceptionable in point of morals, this play possesses +much comic vivacity and interest of character. The courtezan +and the slaves are sketched with spirit and freedom, and +the rapacious disposition of the female dealer in slave-girls, +is well developed. +</p> + +<p> +It is curious that this immoral comedy should have been +so frequently acted in the Italian convents. In particular, a +translation in <hi rend="italic">terza rima</hi> was represented in the monastery of + St Stefano at Venice, in 1514<note place="foot">Walker’s <hi rend="italic">Essay on the Revival of the Drama in Italy</hi>.</note>. It was not of a nature to be +often imitated by modern writers, but Moliere, who has borrowed +so many of the plots of other plays of Plautus, has +extracted from this drama several situations and ideas. Cleæreta, +in the third scene of the first Act of the <hi rend="italic">Asinaria</hi>, gives, +as her advice, to a gallant— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Neque ille scit quid det, quid damni faciat: illi rei studet;</q></l> +<l>Vult placere sese amicæ, vult mihi, vult pedissequæ,</l> +<l>Vult famulis, vult etiam ancillis; et quoque catulo meo</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Sublanditur novus amator.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In like manner, in the <hi rend="italic">Femmes Savantes</hi>, Henriette, while +counselling Clitandre to be complaisant, says— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Un amant fait sa cour ou s’attache son cœur,</q></l> +<l>Il veut de tout le monde y gagner la faveur;</l> +<l>Et pour n’avoir personne a sa flamme contraire,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Jusqu’au chien du logis il s’efforce de plaire.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi>.—It is not known from what Greek author this +play has been taken; but there can be no doubt that it had +<pb n="110"/><anchor id="Pg110"/>its archetype in the Greek drama. The festivals of Ceres +and Bacchus, which in their origin were innocent institutions, +intended to celebrate the blessings of harvest and +vintage, having degenerated by means of priestcraft, became +schools of superstition and debauchery. From the adventures +and intrigues which occurred at the celebration of +religious mysteries, the comic poets of Greece frequently drew + the incidents of their dramas<note place="foot">Fabricius, <hi rend="italic">Biblioth. Græc.</hi> Lib. II. c. 22.</note>, which often turned on damsels +having been rendered, on such occasions, the mothers of children, +without knowing who were the fathers. In like manner, +the intrigue of the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> has its commencement in the +daughter of Euclio being violated during the celebration of +the mysteries of Ceres, without being aware from whom she +had received the injury. The <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi>, however, is principally +occupied with the display of the character of a Miser. +No vice has been so often pelted with the good sentences of +moralists, or so often ridiculed on the stage, as avarice; and +of all the characters that have been there represented, that of +the miser in the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> of Plautus, is perhaps the most +entertaining and best supported. Comic dramas have been +divided into those of intrigue and character, and the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> +is chiefly of the latter description. It is so termed from <hi rend="italic">Aula</hi>, +or <hi rend="italic">Olla</hi>, the diminutive of which is <hi rend="italic">Aulula</hi>, signifying the little +earthen pot that contained a treasure which had been concealed +by his grandfather, but had been discovered by Euclio +the miser, who is the principal character of the play. The +prologue is spoken by the <hi rend="italic">Lar Familiaris</hi> of the house; and +as the play has its origin in the discovery of a treasure deposited +under a hearth, the introduction of this imaginary Being, +if we duly consider the superstitions of the Romans, was +happy and appropriate. The account given by the <hi rend="italic">Lar</hi> of +the successive generations of misers, is also well imagined, as +it convinces us that Euclio was a genuine miser, and of the +true breed. The household god had disclosed the long-concealed +treasure, as a reward for the piety of Euclio’s daughter, +who presented him with offerings of frankincense and of wine, +which, however, it is not very probable the miser’s daughter +could have procured, especially before the discovery of the +treasure. The story of the precious deposit, of which the +spectators could not possibly have been informed without this +supernatural interposition, being thus related, we are introduced +at once to the knowledge of the principal character, +who, having found the treasure, employs himself in guarding +it, and lives in continual apprehension, lest it should be dis<pb n="111"/><anchor id="Pg111"/>covered that he possesses it. Accordingly, he is brought on +the stage driving off his servant, that she may not spy him +while visiting this hoard, and afterwards giving directions of +the strictest economy. He then leaves home on an errand +very happily imagined—an attendance at a public distribution +of money to the poor. Megadorus now proposes to marry +his daughter, and Euclio comically enough supposes that he +has discovered something concerning his newly acquired +wealth; but on his offering to take her without a portion, he +is tranquillized, and agrees to the match. Knowing the disposition +of his intended father-in-law, Megadorus sends provisions +to his house, and also cooks, to prepare a marriage-feast, +but the miser turns them out, and keeps what they had brought. +At length his alarm for discovery rises to such a height, that +he hides his treasure in a grove, consecrated to Sylvanus, +which lay beyond the walls of the city. While thus employed, +he is observed by the slave of Lyconides, the young man who +had violated the miser’s daughter. Euclio coming to recreate +himself with the sight of his gold, finds that it is gone. Returning +home in despair, he is met by Lyconides, who, hearing +of the projected nuptials between his uncle and the miser’s +daughter, now apologizes for his conduct; but the miser +applies all that he says concerning his daughter to his lost +treasure. This play is unfortunately mutilated, and ends +with the slave of Lyconides confessing to his master that he +has found the miser’s hoard, and offering to give it up as the +price of his freedom. It may be presumed, however, that, in +the original, Lyconides got possession of the treasure, and by +its restoration to Euclio, so far conciliated his favour, that he +obtained his daughter in marriage. This conclusion, accordingly, +has been adopted by those who have attempted to +finish the comedy in the spirit of the Latin dramatist. It is +completed on this plan by Thornton, the English translator of +Plautus, and by Antonius Codrus Urceus, a professor in the +University of Bologna, who died in the year 1500. Urceus +has also made the miser suddenly change his nature, and +liberally present his new son-in-law with the restored treasure. +</p> + +<p> +The restless inquietude of Euclio, in concealing his gold in +many different places—his terror on seeing the preparations +for the feast, lest the wine brought in was meant to intoxicate +him, that he might be robbed with greater facility—his dilemma +at being obliged to miss the distribution to the poor—are all +admirable traits of extreme and habitual avarice. Even his +recollection of the expense of a rope, when, in despair at the +loss of his treasure, he resolves to hang himself, though a little +<pb n="112"/><anchor id="Pg112"/>overdone, is sufficiently characteristic. But while the part of +a confirmed miser has been comically and strikingly represented +in these touches, it is stretched in others beyond all +bounds of probability. When Euclio entreats his female +servant to spare the cobwebs—when it is said, that he complains +of being pillaged if the smoke issue from his house—and +that he preserves the parings of his nails—we feel this to +be a species of hoarding which no miser could think of or + enjoy<note place="foot"><p>A Latin prose comedy, entitled <hi rend="italic">Querulus seu Aulularia</hi>, having been found + in one of the most ancient MSS. of Plautus discovered in the Vatican, was by some + erroneously attributed to that dramatist; though, in his prologue, its author quotes + Cicero, and expressly declares, that he purposed to imitate Plautus! It was first + edited in 1564 by Peter Daniel; and is now believed to have been written in the + time of the Emperor Theodosius. In some respects it has an affinity to the + genuine <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> of Plautus. The prologue is spoken by the <hi rend="italic">Lar Familiaris</hi>; + and a miser, called Euclio, on going abroad, had concealed a treasure, contained + in a pot, in some part of his house. While dying, in a foreign land, he + bequeathed to a parasite, who had there insinuated himself into his favour, one half + of his fortune, on condition that he should inform his son Querulus, so called from + his querulous disposition, of the place where his treasure was deposited. The + parasite proceeds to the miser’s native country, and attempts, though unsuccessfully, + to defraud the son of the whole inheritance.</p> + + <p>From a curious mistake, first pointed out by Archbishop Usher, in his <hi rend="italic">Ecclesiastical + Antiquities</hi>, this drama was attributed to Gildas, the British Jeremiah, as + Gibbon calls him; who entitled one of his complaints concerning the affairs of + Britain, <hi rend="italic">Querulus</hi>.—Vossius, <hi rend="italic">de Poet. Lat.</hi> Lib. I. c. 6. § 9.</p></note>.</p> + +<p> +One of the earliest imitations of the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> was, <hi rend="italic">La +Sporta</hi>, a prose Italian comedy, printed at Florence in 1543, +under the name of Giovam-Battista Gelli, but attributed by +some to Machiavel. It is said, that the great Florentine historian +left this piece, in an imperfect state, in the hands of his +friend Bernardino di Giordano of Florence, in whose house his +comedies were sometimes represented, whence it passed into +the possession of Gelli, a writer of considerable humour, who +prepared it for the press; and, according to a practice not +unfrequent in Italy at different periods, published it as his own + production<note place="foot">Walker’s <hi rend="italic">Essay on the Italian Drama</hi>, p. 224.</note>. The play is called <hi rend="italic">Sporta</hi>, from the basket in +which the treasure was contained. The plot and incidents in +Plautus have been closely followed, in so far as was consistent +with modern Italian manners; and where they varied, the +circumstances, as well as names, have been adapted by the +author to the customs and ideas of his country. Euclio is +called Ghirorgoro, and Megadorus, Lapo; the former being +set up as a satire on avarice, the latter as a pattern of proper +economy. +</p> + +<p> +The principal plot of <hi rend="italic">The case is altered</hi>, a comedy attributed +to Ben Jonson, has been taken, as shall be afterwards shown +from the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> of Plautus; but the character of Jaques is +<pb n="113"/><anchor id="Pg113"/>more closely formed on that of Euclio, than any miser on the +modern stage. Jaques having purloined the treasure of a +French Lord Chamont, whose steward he had been, and having +also stolen his infant daughter, fled with them to Italy. +The girl, when she grew up, being very beautiful, had many +suitors; whence her reputed father suspects it is discovered +that he possesses hidden wealth, in the same manner as Euclio +does in the scene with Megadorus. We have a representation +of his excessive anxiety lest he lose this treasure—his concealment +of it—and his examination of Juniper, the cobbler, whom +he suspects to have stolen it; which corresponds to Euclio’s +examination of Strobilus. Most other modern dramatists have +made their miser in love; but in the breast of Jaques all +passions are absorbed in avarice, which is exhibited to us not +so much in ridiculous instances of minute domestic economy, +as in absolute adoration of his gold: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">I’ll take no leave, sweet prince, great emperor!</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">But see thee every minute, king of kings!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is thus he feasts his senses with his treasure: and the very +ground in which it is hidden is accounted hallowed: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">This is the palace, where the god of gold</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Shines like the sun of sparkling majesty!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But the most celebrated imitation of the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> is Moliere’s +<hi rend="italic">Avare</hi>, one of the best and most wonderful imitations +ever produced. Almost nothing is of the French dramatist’s +own invention. Scenes have been selected by him from a +number of different plays, in various languages, which have no +relation to each other; but every thing is so well connected, +that the whole appears to have been invented for this single +comedy. Though chiefly indebted to Plautus, he has not so +closely followed his original as in the <hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>. One +difference, which materially affects the plots of the two plays +and characters of the misers, is, that Euclio was poor till he +unexpectedly found the treasure. He was not known to be +rich, and lived in constant dread of his wealth being discovered. +When any thing was said about riches, he applied it to himself; +and when well received or caressed by any one, he supposed +that he was ensnared. Harpagon, on the other hand, had +amassed a fortune, and was generally known to possess it, +which gives an additional zest to the humour, as we thus enter +into the merriment of his family and neighbours; whereas the +penury of Euclio could scarcely have appeared unreasonable +to the bystanders, who were not in the secret of the acquired +<pb n="114"/><anchor id="Pg114"/>treasure. Moliere has also made his miser in love, or at least +resolved to marry, and amuses us with his anxiety, in believing +himself under the necessity of giving a feast to his intended +bride; which is still better than Euclio’s consternation at the +supper projected by his intended son-in-law. Euclio is constantly +changing the place where he conceals his casket; +Harpagon allows it to remain, but is chiefly occupied with its +security. The idea, however, of so much incident turning on +a casket, is not so happily imagined in the French as in the +Latin comedy; since, in the latter, it was the whole treasure +of which the miser was possessed, and there was at that time +no mode of lending it out safely and to advantage. Harpagon +gives a collation, but orders the fragments to be sent back to +those who had provided it; Euclio retains the provisions, +which had been procured at another’s expense. From the +restraint imposed by modern manners, and the circumstance +of Harpagon being known to be rich, Moliere has been forced +to omit the amusing dilemmas in which Euclio is placed with +regard to his attendance on the distributions to the poor. In +recompense, he has wonderfully improved the scene about the +dowry, as also that in which the miser applies what is said +concerning his daughter to his lost treasure; and, on the whole, +he has displayed the passion of avarice in more of the incidents +and relations of domestic life than the Latin poet. Plautus +had remained satisfied with exhibiting a miser, who deprived +himself of all the comforts of life, to watch night and day over +an unproductive treasure; but Moliere went deeper into the +mind. He knew that avarice is accompanied with selfishness, +and hardness of heart, and falsehood, and mistrust, and usury; +and accordingly, all these vices and evil passions are amalgamated +with the character of the French miser. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi> being a play of character, I have been led +to compare the most celebrated imitations of it rather in the +exhibition of the miserly character than in the incidents of +the piece. Many of the latter which occur in the <hi rend="italic">Avare</hi>, have +not been borrowed from Plautus, yet are not of Moliere’s invention. +Thus he has added from the <hi rend="italic">Pedant Joué</hi> of Cyrano +Bergerac that part of the plot which consists in the love of +the miser and his son for the same woman, as also that which +relates to Valere, a young gentleman in love with the miser’s +daughter, who had got into his service in disguise, and who, +when the miser lost his money, which his son’s servant had +stolen, was accused by another servant of having purloined it. +Moliere’s notion of the miser’s prodigal son borrowing money +from a usurer, and the usurer afterwards proving to be his father, +is from <hi rend="italic">La Belle Plaideuse</hi>, a comedy of Bois-Robert. In an +<pb n="115"/><anchor id="Pg115"/>Italian piece, <hi rend="italic">Le Case Svaligiate</hi>, prior to the time of Moliere, +and in the harlequin taste, Scapin persuades Pantaloon that +the young beauty with whom he is captivated returns his love, +that she sets a particular value on old age, and dislikes youthful +admirers, whence Pantaloon is induced to give his purse to +the flatterer. Frosine attacks the vanity of Harpagon in the +same manner, but he, though not unmoved by the flattery, +retains his money. Moliere has availed himself of a number +of other Italian dramas of the same description for scattered +remarks and situations. The name of Harpagon has been +suggested to him by the continuation of Codrus Urceus, where +Strobilus says that the masters of the present day are so avaricious, +that they may be called Harpies or Harpagons: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Tenaces nimium dominos nostra ætas</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Tulit, quos Harpagones vocare soleo.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +I do not know where Moliere received the hint of the <hi rend="italic">denouement</hi> +of his piece. The conclusion of the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi>, as +already mentioned, is not extant, but it could not have been +so improbable and inartificial as the discovery of Valere and +Marianne for the children of Thomas D’Alburci, who, under +the name of Anselme, had courted the miser’s daughter. +</p> + +<p> +Shadwell, Fielding, and Goldoni, enjoyed the advantage of +studying Moliere’s Harpagon for their delineations of Goldingham, +Lovegold, and Ottavio. In the miser of Shadwell there +is much indecency indeed of his own invention, and some disgusting +representations of city vulgarity and vice; but still he +is hardly entitled to the praise of so much originality as he +claims in his impudent preface.—<q>The foundation of this +play,</q> says he, <q>I took from one of Moliere’s, called L’Avare, +but that having too few persons, and too little action for an +English theatre, I added to both so much, that I may call +more than half of this play my own; and I think I may say, +without vanity, that Moliere’s part of it has not suffered in my +hands. Nor did I ever know a French comedy made use of +by the worst of our poets that was not bettered by them. It +is not barrenness of art or invention makes us borrow from the +French, but laziness; and <hi rend="italic">this</hi> was the occasion of my making +use of <hi rend="italic">L’Avare</hi>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Fielding’s <hi rend="italic">Miser</hi>, the only one of his comedies which does +him credit, is a much more agreeable play than Shadwell’s. +The earlier scenes are a close imitation of Moliere, but the +concluding ones are somewhat different, and the <hi rend="italic">denouement</hi> +is perhaps improved. Mariana is in a great measure a new +character, and those of the servants are rendered more prominent +and important than in the French original. +</p> + +<pb n="116"/><anchor id="Pg116"/> + +<p> +The miser Ottavio, in Goldoni’s <hi rend="italic">Vero Amico</hi>, is entirely +copied from Plautus and Moliere. In the Italian play, however, +the character is in a great measure episodical, and the +principal plot, which gives its title to the piece, and corresponds +with that of Diderot’s <hi rend="italic">Fils Naturel</hi>, has been invented +by the Italian dramatist. +</p> + +<p> +On the whole, Moliere has succeeded best in rendering the +passion of avarice hateful: Plautus and Goldoni have only +made it ridiculous. The profound and poetical avarice of +Jaques possesses something plaintive in its tone, which almost +excites our sympathy, and never our laughter; he is represented +as a worshipper of gold, somewhat as an old Persian +might be of the sun, and he does not raise our contempt by +the absurdities of domestic economy. But Harpagon is +thoroughly detestable, and is in fact detested by his neighbours, +domestics, and children. All these dramatists are +accused of having exhibited rather an allegorical representation +of avarice, than the living likeness of a human Being +influenced by that odious propensity. <q>Plautus,</q> says Hurd, +<q rend="post: none">and also Moliere, offended in this, that for the picture of +the avaricious man they presented us with a fantastic unpleasing +draught of the passion of avarice—I call it a fantastic +draught, because it hath no archetype in nature, and it is +farther an unpleasing one; from being the delineation of a +simple passion, unmixed, it wants</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>‘The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Gives all the strength and colour of our life.’</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This may in general be true, as there are certainly few unmingled +passions; but I suspect that avarice so completely +engrosses the soul, that a simple and unmixed delineation of +it is not remote from nature. <q>The Euclio of Plautus,</q> says +King, in his <hi rend="italic">Anecdotes</hi>, <q>the Avare of Moliere, and Miser of +Shadwell, have been all exceeded by persons who have existed + within my own knowledge<note place="foot">P. 106. Ed. 1819.—I have often wondered, that while the character of a Miser + has been exhibited so frequently, and with such success, on the stage, it should + scarcely have been well delineated, so far as I remember, in any novel of note, + except, perhaps, in the person of Mr. Briggs, in <hi rend="italic">Cecilia</hi>.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Bacchides</hi>:—is so called from two sisters of the name of +Bacchis, who are the courtezans in this play. In a prologue, +which is supposed to be spoken by Silenus, mounted on an +ass, it is said to be taken from a Greek comedy by Philemon. +This information, however, cannot be implicitly relied on, as +the prologue was not written in the time of Plautus, and is +<pb n="117"/><anchor id="Pg117"/>evidently an addition of a comparatively recent date. Some +indeed have supposed that it was prefixed by Petrarch; but +at all events the following lines could not have been anterior +to the conquest of Greece by the Romans:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Samos quæ terra sit, nota est omnibus:</q></l> +<l>Nam maria, terras, monteis, atque insulas</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vostræ legiones reddidere pervias.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The leading incident in this play—a master’s folly and inadvertence +counteracting the deep-laid scheme of a slave to +forward his interest, has been employed by many modern +dramatists for the groundwork of their plots; as we find from +the <hi rend="italic">Inavertito</hi> of Nicolo Barbieri, sirnamed Beltramo, the +<hi rend="italic">Amant Indiscret</hi> of Quinault, Moliere’s <hi rend="italic">Etourdi</hi>, and Dryden’s +<hi rend="italic">Sir Martin Mar-all</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +The third scene of the third act of this comedy, where the +father of Pistoclerus speaks with so much indulgence of the +follies of youth, has been imitated in Moliere’s <hi rend="italic">Fourberies de +Scapin</hi>, and the fifth scene of the fourth act has suggested + one in <hi rend="italic">Le Marriage Interrompu</hi><note place="foot">Act II. sc. 7.</note>, by Cailhava. If it could +be supposed that Dante had read Plautus, the commencement +of Lydus’ soliloquy before the door of Bacchis, might be +plausibly conjectured to have suggested that thrilling inscription +over the gate of hell, in the third Canto of the <hi rend="italic">Inferno</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Pandite, atque aperite propere januam hanc Orci, obsecro!</q></l> +<l>Nam equidem haud aliter esse duco; quippe cui nemo advenit,</l> +<l>Nisi quem spes reliquere omnes —— </l> +</lg> + +<lg> +<l>Per me si va nella città dolente:</l> +<l>Per me si va nell eterno dolore:</l> +<l>Per me si va tra la perduta gente.</l> +<l> * * * * * *</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Lasciate ogni speranza, voi, che entrate.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi>.—The subject and plot of the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> are of a different +description from those of Plautus’ other comedies. +No female characters are introduced; and, as it is said in the +epilogue, or concluding address to the spectators, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Ad pudicos mores facta hæc fabula est:</q></l> +<l>Neque in hâc subagitationes sunt, ullave amatio,</l> +<l>Nec pueri suppositio, nec argenti circumductio;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Neque ubi amans adolescens scortum liberet, clam suum patrem.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Though no females are introduced in it, the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> is the +most tender and amiable of Plautus’ plays, and may be regarded +<pb n="118"/><anchor id="Pg118"/>as of a higher description than his other comedies, since it +hinges on paternal affection and the fidelity of friendship. +Many of the situations are highly touching, and exhibit actions +of generous magnanimity, free from any mixture of burlesque. +It has indeed been considered by some critics as the origin of +that class of dramas, which, under the title of <hi rend="italic">Comedies Larmoyantes</hi>, +was at one time so much admired and so fashionable + in France<note place="foot">Cailhava, <hi rend="italic">L’Art de la Comedie</hi>, Liv. II. c. 9. Ed. Paris, 1772.</note>, and in which wit and humour, the genuine +offspring of Thalia, are superseded by domestic sentiment +and pathos. +</p> + +<p> +Hegio, an Ætolian gentleman, had two sons, one of whom, +when only four years old, was carried off by a slave, and sold +by him in Elis. A war having subsequently broken out between +the Elians and Ætolians, Hegio’s other son was taken captive +by the Elians. The father, with a view of afterwards ransoming +his son, by an exchange, purchased an Elian prisoner, +called Philocrates, along with his servant Tyndarus; and the +play opens with the master, Philocrates, personating his slave, +while the slave, Tyndarus, assumes the character of his master. +By this means Tyndarus remains a prisoner under his master’s +name, while Hegio is persuaded to send the true Philocrates, +under the name of Tyndarus, to Elis, in order to effect the +exchange of his son. The deception, however, is discovered +by Hegio before the return of Philocrates; and the father, +fearing that he had thus lost all hope of ransoming his child, +condemns Tyndarus to labour in the mines. In these circumstances, +Philocrates returns from Elis with Hegio’s son, and +also brings along with him the fugitive slave, who had stolen +his other son in infancy. It is then discovered that Tyndarus +is this child, who, having been sold to the father of Philocrates, +was appointed by him to wait on his son, and had been +gradually admitted to his young master’s confidence and +friendship. +</p> + +<p> +There has been a great dispute among critics and commentators, +whether the dramatic unities have been strictly observed +in this comedy. M. De Coste, in the preface to his French +translation of the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi>, maintains, that the unities of place, +and time, and action, have been closely attended to. Lessing, +who translated the play into German, adopted the opinion of +De Coste with regard to the observance of the unities, and he +has farther pronounced it the most perfect comedy that, in his + time, had yet been represented on the stage<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Beytrage, zur Historie und Aufnahme des Theaters</hi>.</note>. A German +critic, whose letter addressed to Lessing is published in that +<pb n="119"/><anchor id="Pg119"/>author’s works<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Samtliche Schriften</hi>, Tom. XXII. p. 316.</note>, has keenly opposed these opinions, discussing +at considerable length the question of the unities of action, +time, and place, as also pointing out many supposed inconsistencies +and improbabilities in the conduct of the drama. He +objects, in point of verisimilitude, to the long and numerous +<hi rend="italic">aparts</hi>—the soliloquies of the parasite, which begin the first +three acts,—the frequent mention of the market-places and +streets of Rome, while the scene is laid in a town of Greece,—and +the sudden as well as unaccountable appearance of +Stalagmus, the fugitive slave, at the end of the drama. The +most serious objection, however, is that which relates to the +violation of the dramatic unity of time. The scene is laid in +Calydon, the capital of Ætolia; and, at the end of the second +act, Philocrates proceeds from that city to Elis, transacts there +a variety of affairs, and returns before the play is concluded. +Between these two places the distance is fifty miles; and in +going from one to the other it was necessary to cross the bay +of Corinth. It is therefore impossible (contends this critic,) +that De Coste can be accurate in maintaining that the duration +of the drama is only seven or eight hours. Allowing the +poet, however, the greatest poetical license, and giving for +his play the extended period of twenty-four hours, it is scarcely +possible that the previous parts of the drama could have been +gone through, and the long voyage accomplished, in this space +of time. But it farther appears, that Plautus himself did not +wish to claim this indulgence, and intended to crowd the +journey and all the preceding dramatic incidents into twelve +hours at most. He evidently means that the action should be +understood as commencing with the morning: Hegio says, in +the second scene of the first act, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ego ibo ad fratrem, ad alios captivos meos,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Visum ne nocte hâc quippiam turbaverint;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and it is evident that the action terminates with the evening +meal, the preparations for which conclude the fourth act. To +all this Lessing replied, that there was no reason to suppose +that the scene was laid in Calydon, or that the journey was +made to the town of Elis, and that it might easily have been +accomplished within the time prescribed by the dramatic rule +of unities, if nearer points of the Ætolian and Elian territories +be taken than their capitals. +</p> + +<p> +Some of the characters in the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> are very beautifully +drawn. Hegio is an excellent representation of a respectable +<pb n="120"/><anchor id="Pg120"/>rich old citizen: He is naturally a humane good-humoured +man, but his disposition is warped by excess of paternal tenderness. +There is not in any of the comedies of Plautus, a +more agreeable and interesting character than Tyndarus: and +no delineation can be more pleasing than that of his faithful +attachment to Philocrates, by whom he was in return implicitly +trusted, and considered rather in the light of a friend than a +slave. In this play, as in most others of Plautus, the parasite +is a character somewhat of an episodical description: He goes +about prowling for a supper, and is associated to the main +subject of the piece only by the delight which he feels at the +prospect of a feast, to honour the return of Hegio’s son. The +parasites of Plautus are almost as deserving a dissertation as +Shakspeare’s clowns. Parasite, as is well known, was a name +originally applied in Greece to persons devoted to the service +of the gods, and who were appointed for the purpose of keeping +the consecrated provisions of the temples. Diodorus of + Sinope, as quoted by Athenæus<note place="foot">Lib. VI. c. 9.</note>, after speaking of the dignity +of the sacred parasites of Hercules, (who was himself a noted +<hi rend="italic">gourmand</hi>,) mentions that the rich, in emulation of this demi-god, +chose as followers persons called parasites, who were +not selected for their virtues or talents, but were remarkable +for extravagant flattery to their superiors, and insolence to +those inferiors who approached the persons of their patrons. +This was the character which came to be represented on the + stage. We learn from Athenæus<note place="foot">Id. Lib. VI. c. 7.</note>, that a parasite was introduced +in one of his plays by Epicharmus, the founder of the +Greek comedy. The parasite of this ancient dramatist lay at +the feet of the rich, eat the offals from their tables, and drank +the dregs of their cups. He speaks of himself as of a person +ever ready to dine abroad when invited, and when any one is +to be married, to go to his house without an invitation—to +pay for his good cheer by exciting the merriment of the company, +and to retire as soon as he had eat and drunk sufficiently, +without caring whether or not he was lighted out by the + slaves<note place="foot">The best notion of the Greek parasite is to be got in the fragments of the Greek + poets quoted by Athenæus, and in the Letters of Alciphron, a great number of which + are supposed to be addressed by parasites to their brethren, and relate the particulars + of the injurious treatment which they had received at the tables of the Great.</note>. In the most ancient comedies, however, this character +was not denominated parasite, and was first so called in +the plays of Araros, the son of Aristophanes, and one of the +earliest authors of the middle comedy. Antiphanes, a dramatist +of the same class, has given a very full description of the +vocation of a parasite. The part, however, did not become +<pb n="121"/><anchor id="Pg121"/>extremely common till the introduction of the new comedy, +when Diphilus, whose works were frequently imitated on the +Roman stage, particularly distinguished himself by his delineation + of the parasitical character<note place="foot">Athenæus, Lib. VI. c. 17.</note>. In the Greek theatre, the +part was usually represented by young men, dressed in a black +or brown garb, and wearing masks expressive of malignant +gaiety. They carried a goblet suspended round their waists, +probably lest the slaves of their patrons should fill to them in +too small cups; and also a vial of oil to be used at the bath, +which was a necessary preparation before sitting down to +table, for which the parasite required to be always ready at a + moment’s warning<note place="foot">Jul. Pollux, <hi rend="italic">Onomasticon</hi>, Lib. IV. c. 18</note>. +</p> + +<p> +It was thus, too, that the character was represented on the +Roman stage; and it would farther appear, that the parasites, +in the days of Plautus, carried with them a sort of Joe Miller, +as a manual of wit, with which they occasionally refreshed +their vivacity. Thus the parasite, in the <hi rend="italic">Stichus</hi>, says, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ibo intro ad libros, et discam de dictis melioribus;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and again— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Libros inspexi, tam confido, quam potest,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Me meum obtenturum ridiculis meis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The parasite naturally became a leading character of the +Roman stage. In spite of the pride and boasted national independence +of its citizens, the whole system of manners at +Rome was parasitical. The connection between patron and +client, which was originally the cordial intercourse of reciprocal +services, soon became that of haughty superiority on +the one side, and sordid adulation on the other. Every client +was in fact the parasite of some patrician, whose litter he +often followed like a slave, conforming to all his caprices, and +submitting to all his insults, for the privilege of being placed +at the lowest seat of the patron’s table, and there repaying +this indelicate hospitality by the most servile flattery. On the +stage, the principal use of the parasite was to bring out the +other characters from the canvass. Without Gnatho, the +Thraso of Terence would have possessed less confidence; and +without his flatterer, Pyrgopolinices would never have recollected +breaking an elephant’s thigh by a blow of his fist. +</p> + +<p> +The parasite, in the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi>, may be considered as a fair +enough representative of his brethren in the other plays of +<pb n="122"/><anchor id="Pg122"/>Plautus. He submits patiently to all manner of ignominious + treatment<note place="foot">Huic denique manducanti barba vellitur; illi bibenti sedilia subtrahuntur; hic + ligno scissili, ille fragili vitro pascitur.</note>—his spirits rise and sink according as his prospects +of a feast become bright or clouded—he speaks a great deal in +soliloquies, in which he talks much of the jests by which he +attempted to recommend himself as a guest at the feasts of the +Great, but we are not favoured with any of these jests. In +such soliloquies, too, he rather expresses what would justly be +thought of him by others, than what even a parasite was likely +to say of himself. +</p> + +<p> +The parasite is not a character which has been very frequently +represented on the modern stage. It is not one into which an +Italian audience, who are indifferent to good cheer, would +heartily enter. Accordingly, the parasite is not a common +character in the native drama of Italy, and is chiefly exhibited +in the old comedies of Ariosto and Aretine, which are directly +imitated from the plays of Plautus or Terence; but even in +them this character does not precisely coincide with the older +and more genuine school of parasites. Ligurio, who is called +the parasite in the <hi rend="italic">Mandragora</hi> of Machiavel, rather corresponds +to the intriguing slave than to the parasite of the Roman +drama; or at least he resembles the more modern parasites, +who, like the Phormio of Terence, ingratiated themselves with +their patrons by serviceable roguery, rather than by flattery. +Ipocrito, who, in Aretine’s comedy of that name, is also styled +the parasite, is a sort of Tartuffe, with charitable and religious +maxims constantly in his mouth. He does not insinuate +himself into the confidence of his patrons by a gaping admiration +of their foolish sayings, but by extolling their virtues, +and smoothing over their vices; and so far from being treated +with any sort of contumely, he is held in high consideration, +and interposes in all domestic arrangements. +</p> + +<p> +It is still more difficult to find a true parasite on the English +stage. Sir John Falstaff, though something of a parasite, is as +original as he is inimitable. Lazarillo, the hungry courtier in +Beaumont and Fletcher’s <hi rend="italic">Woman Hater</hi>, and Justice Greedy, +in Massinger’s <hi rend="italic">New Way to Pay Old Debts</hi>, to whom Sir +Giles Overreach gives the command of the kitchen, and absolute +authority there, in respect of the entertainment, are +rather epicures in constant quest of delicacies, than hungry +parasites, who submit to any indignity for the sake of a meal. +Lazarillo’s whole intrigue consists of schemes for being invited +to dine where there was an umbrana’s head, and we are told +that +</p> + +<pb n="123"/><anchor id="Pg123"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">He hath a courtly kind of hunger,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">And doth hunt more for novelty than plenty;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and Justice Greedy’s delight is placed in rich canary, a larded +pheasant, or a red deer baked in puff paste. Mosca, in Ben +Jonson’s <hi rend="italic">Volpone</hi>, who grasps at presents made to him by the +legacy-hunters of his patron, and who at length attempts to +defraud the patron himself, is a parasite of infinitely greater +artifice and villainy than any of those in Plautus; and in the +opinion of the late editor of Jonson, outweighs the aggregate +merit of all Plautus’s parasites. Colax, who, in the <hi rend="italic">Muses’ +Looking-Glass</hi> of Randolph, chimes in with the sentiments of +each character, approving, by an immense variety of subtle +arguments, every extreme of vice and folly, appears to flatter +all those allegorical representations of the passions exhibited +in this drama, rather from courtesy than want. He tells us, +indeed, that +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>’Tis gold gives Flattery all her eloquence;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +but this part of his character is not brought prominently forward, +nor is he represented as a glutton or epicure. Perhaps +the character which comes nearest to the parasite of the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> +is in a play not very generally known, the <hi rend="italic">Canterbury +Guests</hi>, by Ravenscroft. +</p> + +<p> +But although it might be difficult to find a precise copy in +modern times of the parasite of the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi>, its principal plot +has been repeatedly imitated, particularly in an old English +drama, <hi rend="italic">The Case is altered</hi>, supposed to have been written by +Ben Jonson, and published in some editions of his works. +Count Ferneze, a nobleman of Vicenza, and who corresponds +to Hegio, lost a son called Camillo, when Vicenza was taken +by the French. His other son, Paulo, is afterwards made +prisoner by the same enemies. Chamont, the French general, +and Camillo Ferneze, who, under the name of Gaspar, had +entered into the French service, are taken prisoners by the +Italians; and while in captivity they agree to change names, and +apparent situations. Camillo, who passes for Chamont, is +carefully retained in confinement at Vicenza, while that general +is despatched by the Count Ferneze to procure the ransom of +his son Paulo. The Count having subsequently detected the +imposture, Camillo is put in fetters and ordered for execution. +Chamont, however, returns with Paulo, whom he had now +redeemed, and the Count afterwards discovers, by means of a +tablet hanging round his neck, that the youth Camillo, whom +he was treating with such severity, was the son whom he had +lost during the sack of Vicenza. +</p> + +<pb n="124"/><anchor id="Pg124"/> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> is also the foundation of <hi rend="italic">Les Captifs</hi>, a comedy +of Rotrou, where a father, afflicted by the captivity of a son, +purchases all the slaves exposed to sale in Ætolia, in the +hope of recovering his child. The interest and vivacity of +the play, which is one of the best of its author, are supported +by the pleasantries of a parasite, and a variety of ingenious +incidents. Ginguené has mentioned, in the <hi rend="italic">Histoire Litteraire +d’Italie</hi>, that the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> must also have suggested the +<hi rend="italic">Suppositi</hi>, a comedy by the author of the <hi rend="italic">Orlando Furioso</hi>. +Ariosto, however, has made the incidents of the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> subservient +to a love intrigue, and not to the deliverance of a +prisoner. Whilst Erostrato, a young gentleman, acts the part +of a domestic in the house of his mistress’s father, his servant, +Dulippo, personates his master, and studies in his place at the +university of Ferrara. At the conclusion of the piece, Dulippo +is discovered to be the son of an old and rich doctor of laws, +who was the rival in love of Erostrato. There is a parasite in +this play as in the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi>, but the character of the doctor is +new, and the scenes chiefly consist of the schemes which are +laid by the master and servant to disappoint his views as to +the lady of whom Erostrato is enamoured. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>. This play is so called from the name of a female +slave, on whom, though she does not once appear on the +stage, the whole plot of the drama hinges. It is said in the +prologue to have been translated from Diphilus, a Greek +writer of the new comedy, by whom it was called <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Κληρουμενοι</foreign><!--[Greek: Klêroumenoi]-->, +the Lot Drawers. Diphilus was a contemporary of Menander; +he was distinguished by his comic wit and humour and occasionally +by the moral sententious character of his dramas, of +which he is said to have written a hundred, and from which +larger fragments have been preserved than from any Greek +plays belonging to the new comedy. Notwithstanding what +is said in the Delphine Plautus, it is evident from its terms, +that the prologue could not have been prefixed by the dramatist +himself, but must have been written a good many years +after his death, on occasion of a revival of the <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>. It +would appear from it that the plays of Plautus had rather gone +out of fashion immediately after his death; but the public at +length, tired with the new comedies, began to call for the +reproduction of those of Plautus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nam, nunc novæ quæ prodeunt comœdiæ,</q></l> +<l>Multo sunt nequiores, quam nummi novi,</l> +<l>Nos postquam rumores populi intelleximus,</l> +<l>Studiose expetere vos Plautinas fabulas,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Antiquam ejus edimus comœdiam.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="125"/><anchor id="Pg125"/> + +<p> +From the same prologue it would seem that this play, when +first represented, had surpassed in popularity all the dramatic +productions of the time— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Hæc quum primùm acta est, vicit omnes fabulas.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It cannot, indeed, be denied, that, in the <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>, the unities +of time and place are rigidly observed, and, in point of +humour, it is generally accounted inferior to none of Plautus’s +dramas. The nature, however, of the subject, will +admit only of a very slight sketch. The female slave, who +gives name to the comedy, is beloved by her master, Stalino, +and by his son, Euthynicus,—the former of whom employs +Olympio, his bailiff in the country, and the latter his armour-bearer, +Chalinus, to marry Casina, each being in hopes, by +this contrivance, to obtain possession of the object of his +affections. Cleostrata, Stalino’s wife, suspecting her husband’s +designs, supports the interests of her son, and, after +much dispute, it is settled, that the claims of the bailiff and +armour-bearer should be decided by lot. Fortune having +declared in favour of the former, Stalino obtains the loan of +a neighbour’s house for the occasion, and it is arranged, that +its mistress should be invited for one evening by Cleostrata; +but the jealous lady counteracts this plan by declining the +honour of the visit. At length all concur in making a dupe +of the old man. Chalinus is dressed up in wedding garments +to personate Casina, and the play concludes with the mortification +of Stalino, at finding he had been imposed on by a +counterfeit bride. +</p> + +<p> +The plan here adopted by Stalino for securing possession +of Casina, is nearly the same with that pursued by the Count +Almaviva, in Beaumarchais’ prose comedy, <hi rend="italic">Le Marriage de +Figaro</hi>; where the Count, with similar intentions, plans a +marriage between Suzanne and his valet-de-chambre, Figaro, +but has his best-laid schemes invariably frustrated. The concluding +part of the <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi> has probably, also, suggested the +whole of the <hi rend="italic">Marescalco</hi>, a comedy of the celebrated Aretine, +which turns on the projected nuptials of the character who +gives name to the piece, and whose supposed bride is discovered, +during the performance of the marriage ceremony, to +be a page of the Duke of Mantua, dressed up in wedding garments, +in a frolic of the Duke’s courtiers, in order to impose +on the Marescalco. Those scenes in the <hi rend="italic">Ragazzo</hi> of Lodovico +Dolce, where a similar deception is practised and where +Giacchetto, the disguised youth, minutely details the event +of the trick of which he was made the chief instrument, +<pb n="126"/><anchor id="Pg126"/>have also been evidently drawn from the same productive + origin.<note place="foot">See Act ii. sc. 2. and Act iv. sc. 1.</note> +</p> + +<p> +The closest imitation, however, of the <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>, is Machiavel’s +comedy <hi rend="italic">Clitia</hi>. Many of its scenes, indeed, have been +literally translated from the Latin, and the incidents are +altered in very few particulars. The Stalino of Plautus is +called Nicomaco, and his wife Sofronia: their son is named +Cleandro, and the dependents employed to court Clitia for +behoof of their masters, Eustachio and Pirro. The chief +difference is, that the young lover, who is supposed to be +absent in the <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>, is introduced on the stage by the Italian +author, and the object of his affections is a young lady, +brought up and educated by his parents, and originally +intrusted to their care by one of their friends, which makes +the proposal of her marrying either of the servants offered to +her choice more absurd than in the Latin original. The +bridal garments, too, are not assumed by one of the rival +servants, but by a third character, introduced and employed +for the purpose. This comedy of Machiavel, his <hi rend="italic">Mandragola</hi>, +and the renowned tale of Belfegor, were the productions +with which that profound politician and historian, who established +a school of political philosophy in the Italian seat of +the Muses—who applied a fine analysis to the Roman history, +and a subtler than Aristotle to the theory of government—attempted, +as he himself has so beautifully expressed it, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="post: none">Fare il suo tristo tempo piu soave;</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Perche altrove non have,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Dove voltare il viso,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Che gli è stato interciso</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mostrar con altre imprese altra virtute.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Cistellaria</hi>, (the Casket.)—The prologue to this play is +spoken by the god <hi rend="italic">Auxilium</hi>, at the end of the first act. It +explains the subject of the piece—compliments the Romans +on their power and military glory—and concludes with exhorting +them to overcome the Carthaginians, and punish them as +they deserve. Hence it is probable, that this play was +written during the second Punic war, which terminated in the +year 552; and as Plautus was born in the year 525, it may be +plausibly conjectured, that the <hi rend="italic">Cistellaria</hi> was one of his +earliest productions. This also appears from its greater rudeness +when compared with his other plays, and from the shortness +and simplicity of the plot. But though the argument is +trite and sterile, it is enlivened by a good deal of comic +<pb n="127"/><anchor id="Pg127"/> +humour, particularly in the delineation of some of the subordinate +characters. Like many others of Plautus’s plays, it +turns on the accidental recognition of a lost child by her +parents, in consequence of the discovery of a casket, containing +some toys, which had been left with her when exposed, +and by means of which she is identified and acknowledged. +</p> + +<p> +In ancient times these recognitions, so frequently exhibited +on the stage, were not improbable. The customs of exposing +children, and of reducing prisoners of war to slavery—the +little connection or intercourse between different countries, +from the want of inns or roads—and the consequent difficulty +of tracing a lost individual—rendered such incidents, to us +apparently so marvellous, of not unusual occurrence in real +life. In Greece, particularly, divided as it was into a number +of small states, and surrounded by a sea infested with pirates, +who carried on a commerce in slaves, free-born children were +frequently carried off, and sold in distant countries. By the +laws of Athens, marriage with a foreigner was null; or, at +least, the progeny of such nuptials were considered as illegitimate, +and not entitled to the privileges of Athenian citizens. +Hence, the recognition of the supposed stranger was +of the utmost importance to herself and lover. In real life, +this recognition may have been sometimes actually aided by +ornaments and trinkets. Parents frequently tied jewels and +rings to the children whom they exposed, in order that such +as found them might be encouraged to nourish and educate +them, and that they themselves might afterwards be enabled + to discover them, if Providence took care for their safety<note place="foot">Potter’s <hi rend="italic">Antiquities of Greece</hi>. Book IV. c. 14.</note>. +Plots, accordingly, which hinged on such circumstances, were +invented even by the writers of the old Greek comedy. One +of the later pieces of Aristophanes, now lost, entitled <hi rend="italic">Cocalus</hi>, +is said to have presented a recognition; and nearly the same +sort of intrigue was afterwards employed by Menander, and, +from his example, by Plautus and Terence. From imitation +of the Greek and Latin comedies, similar incidents became +common both in dramatic and romantic fiction. The pastoral +romance of Longus hinges on a recognition of this species; +and those elegant productions, in which the Italians have +introduced the characters and occupations of rural life into +the drama, are frequently founded on the exposure of children, +who, after being brought up as shepherds by reputed fathers, +are recognised by their real parents, from ornaments or tokens +fastened to their persons when abandoned in infancy or childhood. +</p> + +<pb n="128"/><anchor id="Pg128"/> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Cistellaria</hi> has been more directly imitated in <hi rend="italic">Gli +Incantesimi</hi> of Giovam-Maria Cecchi, a Florentine dramatist +of the sixteenth century. That part, however, of the plot +which gives name to the piece, has been invented by the +Italian author himself. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Curculio</hi>.—The subject of this play, turns on a recognition +similar to that which occurs in the <hi rend="italic">Cistellaria</hi>. It derives its +title from the name of a parasite, who performs the part +usually assigned by Plautus to an intriguing slave; and he is +called Curculio, from a species of worm which eats through +corn. +</p> + +<p> +It is worthy of observation, that in the fourth act of this +play, the Choragus, who was master of the Chorus, and stage-manager, +or leader of the band, is introduced, expressing his +fear lest he should be deprived of the clothes he had lent to +Curculio, and addressing to the spectators a number of satirical +remarks on Roman manners. +</p> + +<p> +Vossius has noticed the inadvertency or ignorance of Plautus +in this drama, where, though the scene is laid in Epidaurus, +he sends the parasite to Caria, and brings him back in four +days. This part of the comedy he therefore thinks has been +invented by Plautus himself, since a Greek poet, to whom the +geography of these districts must have been better known, +would not have carried the parasite to so great a distance in +so short a period. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Epidicus</hi>.—This play is so called from the name of a slave +who sustains a principal character in the comedy, and on +whose rogueries most of the incidents depend. Its most +serious part consists in the discovery of a damsel, who proves +to be sister to a young man by whom she has been purchased +as a slave. The play has no prologue; but, at the beginning, +a character is introduced, which the ancients called <hi rend="italic">persona +protatica</hi>,—that is, a person who enters only once, and at the +commencement of the piece, for the sake of unfolding the +argument, and does not appear again in any part of the drama. +Such are Sosia, in the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> of Terence, and Davus, in his +<hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi>. This is accounted rather an inartificial mode of +informing the audience of the circumstances previous to the +opening of the piece. It is generally too evident, that the +narrative is made merely for the sake of the spectators; as +there seldom appears a sufficient reason for one of the parties +being so communicative to the other. Such explanations +should come round, as it were, by accident, or be drawn involuntarily +from the characters themselves in the course of +the action. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Epidicus</hi> is said to have been a principal favourite of +<pb n="129"/><anchor id="Pg129"/>the author himself; and, indeed, one of the characters in his +<hi rend="italic">Bacchides</hi> exclaims, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Etiam Epidicum, quam ego fabulam æque ac me ipsum amo.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But, though popular in the ancient theatre, the <hi rend="italic">Epidicus</hi> does +not appear to be one of the plays of Plautus which has been +most frequently imitated on the modern stage. There was, +however, a very early Italian imitation of it in the <hi rend="italic">Emilia</hi>, a +comedy of Luigi da Groto, better known by the appellation of +Cieco D’Adria, one of the earliest romantic poets of his country. +The trick, too, of Epidicus, in persuading his master to buy a +slave with whom his son was in love, has suggested the first +device fallen on by Mascarelle, the valet in Moliere’s <hi rend="italic">Etourdi</hi>, +in order to place the female slave Celie at the disposal of her +lover, by inducing his master to purchase her. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Menæchmi</hi>—hinges on something of the same species of +humour as the <hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>—a doubt and confusion with regard +to the identity of individuals. According to the Delphin +Plautus, it was taken from a lost play of Menander, entitled +<foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Διδυμοι</foreign><!--[Greek: Didymoi]-->; but other commentators have thought, that it was +more probably derived from Epicharmus, or some other Sicilian +dramatist. +</p> + +<p> +In this play, a merchant of Syracuse had two sons, possessing +so strong a personal resemblance to each other, that they +could not be distinguished even by their parents. One of +these children, called Menæchmus, was lost by his father in a +crowd on the streets of Syracuse, and, being found by a Greek +merchant, was carried by him to Epidamnum, (Dyracchium,) +and adopted as his son. Meanwhile the brother, (whose name, +in consequence of this loss, had been changed to Menæchmus,) +having grown up, had set out from Syracuse in quest of his +relative. After a long search he arrived at Epidamnum, where +his brother had by this time married, and had also succeeded +to the merchant’s fortune. The amusement of the piece hinges +on the citizens of Epidamnum mistaking the Syracusan stranger +for his brother, and the family of the Epidamnian brother +falling into a corresponding error. In this comedy we have +also the everlasting parasite; and the first act opens with a +preparation for an entertainment, which Menæchmus of Epidamnum +had ordered for his mistress Erotium, and to which +the parasite was invited. The Syracusan happening to pass, +is asked to come in by his brother’s mistress, and partakes +with her of the feast. He also receives from her, in order to +bear it to the embroiderer’s, a robe which his brother had +carried off from his wife, with the view of presenting it to this +<pb n="130"/><anchor id="Pg130"/>mistress. Afterwards he is attacked by his brother’s jealous +wife, and her father; and, as his answers to their reproaches +convince them that he is deranged, they send straightway for +a physician. The Syracusan escapes; but they soon afterwards +lay hold of the Epidamnian, in order to carry him to +the physician’s house, when the servant of the Syracusan, who +mistakes him for his master, rescues him from their hands. +The Epidamnian then goes to his mistress with the view of +persuading her to return the robe to his wife. At length the +whole is unravelled by the two Menæchmi meeting; when the +servant of the Syracusan, surprised at their resemblance, discovers, +after a few questions to each, that Menæchmus of +Epidamnum is the twin-brother of whom his master had been +so long in search, and who now agrees to return with them to +Syracuse. +</p> + +<p> +The great number of those Latin plays, where the merriment +consists in mistakes arising from personal resemblances, must +be attributed to the use of masks, which gave probability to +such dramas; and yet, if the resemblance was too perfect, the +humour, I think, must have lost its effect, as the spectators +would not readily perceive the error that was committed. +</p> + +<p> +No play has been so repeatedly imitated as the Menæchmi on +the modern stage, particularly the Italian, where masks were +also frequently employed. The most celebrated Italian imitation +of the <hi rend="italic">Menæchmi</hi> is <hi rend="italic">Lo Ipocrito</hi> of Aretine, where the +twin-brothers, Liseo and Brizio, had the same singular degree +of resemblance as the Menæchmi. Brizio had been carried +off a prisoner in early youth during the sack of Milan, and returns +to that city, after a long absence, in the first act of the +play, in quest of his relations. Liseo’s servants, and his parasite, +Lo Ipocrito, all mistake Brizio for their patron, and his +wife takes him to share an entertainment prepared at her husband’s +house, and also intrusts him with the charge of some +ornaments belonging to her daughter; while, on the other +hand, Brizio’s servant mistakes Liseo for his master. The +interest of the play arises from the same sort of confusion as +that which occurs in the <hi rend="italic">Menæchmi</hi>; and from the continual +astonishment of those who are deceived by the resemblance, +at finding an individual deny a conversation which they were +persuaded he had held a few minutes before. The play is +otherwise excessively involved, in consequence of the introduction +of the amours and nuptials of the five daughters of +Liseo. The plot of the Latin comedy has also been followed +in <hi rend="italic">Le Moglie</hi> of Cecchi, and in the <hi rend="italic">Lucidi</hi> of Agnuolo Firenzuola; +but the incidents have been, in a great measure, adapted +by these dramatists to the manners of their native country. +<pb n="131"/><anchor id="Pg131"/>Trissino, in his <hi rend="italic">Simillimi</hi>, has made little change on his original, +except adding a chorus of sailors; as, indeed, he has +himself acknowledged, in his dedication to the cardinal, Alessandro +Farnese. In <hi rend="italic">Gli due Gemelli</hi>, which was long a +favourite piece on the Italian stage, Carlini acted both brothers; +the scenes being so contrived that they were never brought +on the stage together—in the same manner as in our farce of +<hi rend="italic">Three and the Deuce</hi>, where the idea of giving different characters +and manners to the three brothers, with a perfect +personal resemblance, by creating still greater astonishment +in their friends and acquaintances, seems an agreeable addition. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Menæchmi</hi> was translated into English towards the end +of the sixteenth century, by William Warner, the author of +<hi rend="italic">Albion’s England</hi>. This version, which was first printed in +1595, and is entitled, <q>Menæchmi, a pleasaunt and fine conceited +comedy, taken out of the most excellent wittie poet +Plautus, chosen purposely, as least harmefull, yet most delightful,</q> +was unquestionably the origin of Shakspeare’s <hi rend="italic">Comedy +of Errors</hi>. The resemblance of the two Antipholis’, and the +other circumstances which give rise to the intrigue, are nearly +the same as in Plautus. Some of the mistakes, too, which +occur on the arrival of Antipholis of Syracuse at Ephesus, +have been suggested by the Latin play. Thus, the Syracusan, +on coming to Ephesus, dines with his brother’s wife. This +lady had under repair, at the goldsmith’s, a valuable chain, +which her husband resolves to present to his mistress, but the +goldsmith gives it to the Syracusan. At length the Ephesian +is believed insane by his friends, who bring Doctor Pinch, a +conjurer, to exorcise him. Shakspeare has added the characters +of the twin Dromios, the servants of the Antipholis’s, who +have the same singular resemblance to each other as their +masters, which has produced such intricacy of plot that it is +hardly possible to unravel the incidents. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Comedy of Errors</hi> is accounted one of the earliest, +and is certainly one of the least happy efforts of Shakspeare’s +genius. I cannot agree with M. Schlegel, in thinking it +better than the Menæchmi of Plautus, or even than the best +modern imitation of that comedy—<hi rend="italic">Les Menechmes, ou Les +Jumeaux</hi>, of the French poet Regnard, which is, at least, a +more lively and agreeable imitation. All the scenes, however, +have been accommodated to French manners; and the plot +differs considerably from that of Plautus, being partly formed +on an old French play of the same title, by Rotrou, which +appeared as early as 1636. One chief distinction is, that the +Chevalier Menechme knows of the arrival of his brother from +<pb n="132"/><anchor id="Pg132"/>the country, and knows that he had come to Paris in order to +receive an inheritance bequeathed to him by his uncle, as also +to marry a young lady of whom the Chevalier was enamoured. +The Chevalier avails himself of the resemblance to prosecute +his love-suit with the lady, and to receive the legacy from the +hands of an attorney, while his brother is in the meantime +harassed by women to whom the Chevalier had formerly paid +addresses, and is arrested for his debts. It was natural enough, +as in Plautus, that an infant, stolen and carried to a remote +country, should have transmitted no account of himself to his +family, and should have been believed by them to be dead; +but this can with difficulty be supposed of Regnard’s Chevalier, +who had not left his paternal home in Brittany till the +usual age for entering on military service, and had ever since +resided chiefly at Paris. The Chevalier finds, from letters +delivered to him by mistake, that his brother had come to +town to receive payment of a legacy recently bequeathed to +him: But, unless it was left to any one who bore the name of +Menechme, it is not easy to see how the attorney charged +with the payment, should have allowed himself to be duped +by the Chevalier. Nor is it likely that, suspicious as the elder +Menechme is represented, he should trust so much to his +brother’s valet, or allow himself to be terrified in the public +street and open day into payment of a hundred louis d’or. It +is equally improbable that Araminte should give up the Chevalier +to her niece, or that the elder Menechme should marry +the old maid merely to get back half the sum of which his +brother had defrauded him. That all the adventures, besides, +should terminate to the advantage of the Chevalier, has too +much an air of contrivance, and takes away that hazard which +ought to animate pieces of this description, and which excites +the interest in Plautus, where the incidents prove fortunate or +unfavourable indiscriminately to the two brothers. +</p> + +<p> +In Plautus, the robe which Menæchmus of Epidamnum carries +off from his wife, suffices for almost the whole intrigue. +It alone brings into play the falsehood and avarice of the +courtezan, the inclination of both the Menæchmi for pleasure, +the gluttony of the parasite, and rage of the jealous +wife: But in the French <hi rend="italic">Menechmes</hi>,—trunks, letters, a portrait, +promises of marriage, and presents, are heaped on each +other, to produce accumulated mistakes. Regnard has also +introduced an agreeable variety, by discriminating the characters +of the brothers, between whom Plautus and Shakspeare +have scarcely drawn a shade of difference. The Chevalier +is a polished gentleman—very ingenious; but, I think, +not very honest: His brother is blunt, testy, and impatient, +<pb n="133"/><anchor id="Pg133"/>and not very wise. The difference, indeed, in their language +and manners, is so very marked, that it seems hardly possible, +whatever might be the personal resemblance, that the Chevalier’s +mistress could have been deceived. These peculiarities +of disposition, however, render the mistakes, and the country +brother’s impatience under them, doubly entertaining— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Faudra-t-il que toujours je sois dans l’embarras</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">De voir une furie attachée a mes pas?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And when assailed by Araminte, the old maid to whom his +brother had promised marriage— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Esprit, demon, lutin, ombre, femme, ou furie,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Qui que tu sois, enfin laisse moi, je te prie.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +When his brother is at last discovered, and indubitably recognized, +he exclaims, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Mon frere en verité—Je m’en rejouis fort,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mais j’avais cependant compté sur votre mort.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Boursault’s comedy, <hi rend="italic">Les Menteurs qui ne mentent point</hi>, +though somewhat different in its fable from the Latin <hi rend="italic">Menæchmi</hi>, +is founded on precisely the same species of humour—the +exact resemblance of the two Nicandres occasioning ludicrous +mistakes and misunderstandings among their valets and +mistresses. +</p> + +<p> +The most recent French imitation of the play of Plautus is +the <hi rend="italic">Menechmes Grecs</hi>, by Cailhava, in which the plot is still +more like the Latin comedy than the <hi rend="italic">Menechmes</hi> of Regnard; +but the characters are new. This piece has been extremely +popular on the modern French stage.—<q>Le public,</q> says +Chenier, <q>s’est empressé de rendre justice a la peinture +piquante de mœurs de la Grece, a la verité des situations, au +naturel du dialogue, au merite rare d’une gaité franche, qui + ne degenere pas en bouffonnerie<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tableau de la Litterature <sic>Francoise</sic></hi>.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Miles Gloriosus</hi>, (the Braggart Captain.) This was a character +of the new Greek comedy, introduced and brought to +perfection by Philemon and Menander. These dramatists +wrote during the reigns of the immediate successors of Alexander +the Great. At that period, his generals who had +established sovereignties in Syria and Egypt, were in the +practice of recruiting their armies by levying mercenaries in +Greece. The soldiers who had thus served in the wars of the +Seleucidæ and Ptolemies, were in the habit, when they re<pb n="134"/><anchor id="Pg134"/>turned home to Greece after their campaigns, of astonishing +their friends with fabulous relations of their exploits in distant +countries. Having been engaged in wars with which Athens +had no immediate concern or interest, these partizans met +with little respect or sympathy from their countrymen, and +their lies and bravadoes having made them detested in Athenian + society<note place="foot">Alciphron, <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi></note>, they became the prototypes of that dramatic +character of which the constant attributes were the most +absurd vanity, stupidity, profusion, and cowardice. This +overcharged character, along with that of the slave and parasite, +were transferred into the dramas of Plautus, the faithful +mirrors of the new Greek comedy. The first act of the +<hi rend="italic">Miles Gloriosus</hi> has little to do with the plot: It only serves +to acquaint us with the character of the Captain Pyrgopolinices; +and it is for this purpose alone that Plautus has introduced +the parasite, who does not return to the stage after the +first scene. The boasts of this captain are quite extravagant, +but they are not so gross as the flatteries of the parasite: +indeed it is not to be conceived that any one could swallow +such compliments as that he had broken an elephant’s thigh +with his fist, and slaughtered seven thousand men in one day, +or that he should not have perceived the sarcasms of the +parasite intermixed with his fulsome flattery. Previous, however, +to the invention of gunpowder, more could be performed +in war by the personal prowess of individuals, than can be +now accomplished; and hence the character of the braggart +captain may not have appeared quite so exaggerated to the +ancients as it seems to us. One man of peculiar strength and +intrepidity often carried dismay into the hostile squadrons, as +Goliah defied all the armies of Israel, and, with a big look, +and a few arrogant words, struck so great a terror, that the +host fled before him. +</p> + +<p> +Most European nations being imbued with military habits +and manners for many centuries after their first rise, the part +of a boasting coward was one of the broadest, and most obviously +humorous characters, that could be presented to the +spectators. Accordingly, the braggart Captain, though he +has at length disappeared, was one of the most notorious personages +on the early Italian, French, and English stage. +</p> + +<p> +Tinca, the braggart Captain in <hi rend="italic">La Talanta</hi>, a comedy by +Aretine, is a close copy of Thraso, the soldier in Terence, the +play being taken from the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>, where Thraso is a chief +character. But Spampana, the principal figure in the <hi rend="italic">Farsa +Satira Morale</hi>, a dramatic piece of the fifteenth century, by +<pb n="135"/><anchor id="Pg135"/>Venturino of Pesaro, was the original and genuine Capitano +Glorioso, a character well known, and long distinguished in +the Italian drama. He was generally equipped with a mantle +and long rapier; and his personal qualities nearly resembled +those of the Count di Culagna, the hero of Tassoni’s mock +heroic poem <hi rend="italic">La Secchia Rapita</hi>:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quest’ era un Cavalier bravo e galante,</q></l> +<l>Ch’era fuor de perigli un Sacripante.</l> +<l>Ma ne perigli un pezzo di polmone:</l> +<l>Spesso ammazzato avea qualche gigante,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">E si scopriva poi, ch’era un cappone.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This military poltroon long kept possession of the Italian +stage, under the appellations of Capitan Spavento and Spezzafer, +till about the middle of the sixteenth century, when he +yielded his place to the Capitano Spagnuolo, whose business +was to utter Spanish rodomontades, to kick out the native +Italian Captain in compliment to the Spaniards, and then +quietly accept of a drubbing from Harlequin. When the +Spaniards had entirely lost their influence in Italy, the Capitan +Spagnuolo retreated from the stage, and was succeeded +by that eternal poltroon, Scaramuccio, a character which was +invented by Tiberio Fiurilli, the companion of the boyhood of + Louis XIV<note place="foot">Walker’s <hi rend="italic">Essay on the Revival of the Drama in Italy</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +In imitation of the Italian captain, the early French dramatists +introduced a personage, who patiently received blows +while talking of dethroning emperors and distributing crowns. +The part was first exhibited in <hi rend="italic">Le Brave</hi>, by Baif, acted in +1567; but there is no character which comes so near to the +Miles Gloriosus of Plautus, as that of Chasteaufort in Cyrano +Bergerac’s <hi rend="italic">Pedant Joué</hi>. In general, the French captains +have more rodomontade and solemnity, with less buffoonery, +than their Italian prototypes. The captain Matamore, in +Corneille’s <hi rend="italic">Illusion Comique</hi>, actually addresses the following +lines to his valet:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">II est vrai que je rêve, et ne saurois resoudre,</q></l> +<l>Lequel des deux je dois le premier mettre en poudre,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Du grand Sophi de Perse, ou bien du grand Mogol.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And again— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Le seul bruit de mon nom renverse les murailles,</q></l> +<l>Defait les escadrons, et gagne les batailles;</l> +<l>D’un seul commandement que je fais aux trois Parques,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Je depeuple l’état des plus heureux monarques.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="136"/><anchor id="Pg136"/> + +<p> +Corneille’s Matamore also resembles the Miles Gloriosus, in +his self-complacency on the subject of personal beauty, and +his belief that every woman is in love with him. Pyrgopolinices +declares— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Miserum esse pulchrum hominem nimis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And in like manner, Matamore— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ciel qui sais comme quoi j’en suis persecuté.</q></l> +<l>Un peu plus de repos avec moins de beaute.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Fais qu’un si long mepris enfin la desabuse.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Scarron, who was nearly contemporary with Corneille, painted +this character in Don Gaspard de Padille, the <hi rend="italic">Fanfaron</hi>, as +he is called, of the comedy <hi rend="italic">Jodelet Duelliste</hi>. Gaspard, however, +is not a very important or prominent character of the +piece. Jodelet himself, the valet of Don Felix, seems intended +as a burlesque or caricature of all the braggarts who had preceded +him. Having received a blow, he is ever vowing vengeance +against the author of the injury in his absence, but on +his appearance, suddenly becomes tame and submissive. +</p> + +<p> +The braggart captains of the old English theatre have +much greater merit than the utterers of these nonsensical +rhapsodies of the French stage. Falstaff has been often considered +as a combination of the characters of the parasite and +Miles Gloriosus; but he has infinitely more wit than either; +and the liberty of fiction in which he indulges, is perhaps +scarcely more than is necessary for its display. His cheerfulness +and humour are of the most characteristic and captivating +sort, and instead of suffering that contumely with +which the parasite and Miles Gloriosus are loaded, laughter +and approbation attend his greatest excesses. His boasting +speeches are chiefly humorous; jest and merriment account +for most of them, and palliate them all. It is only subsequent +to the robbery that he discovers the traits of a Miles Gloriosus. +Most of the ancient braggarts bluster and boast of distant +wars, beyond the reach of knowledge or evidence—of exploits +performed in Persia and Armenia—of storms and stratagems—of +falling pell-mell on a whole army, and putting thousands +to the sword, till, by some open and apparent fact, they are +brought to shame as cowards and liars; but Falstaff’s boasts +refer to recent occurrences, and he always preserves himself +from degradation by the address with which he defies detection, +and extricates himself from every difficulty. His character, +however, in the <hi rend="italic">Merry Wives of Windsor</hi>, has some +affinity to the captains of the Roman stage, from his being +<pb n="137"/><anchor id="Pg137"/>constantly played on in consequence of his persuasion that +women are in love with him. The swaggering Pistol in +<hi rend="italic">King Henry IV.</hi>, is chiefly characterized by his inflated language, +and is, as Doll calls him, merely <q>a fustian rascal.</q> +Bessus, in Beaumont and Fletcher’s <hi rend="italic">King and No King</hi>, is +said by Theobald to be a copy of Falstaff; but he has little +or none of his humour. Bessus was an abusive wretch, and +so much contemned, that no one called his words in question; +but, afterwards, while flying in battle, having accidentally +rushed on the enemy, he acquired a reputation for valour; +and being now challenged to combat by those whom he had +formerly traduced, his great aim is to avoid fighting, and yet +to preserve, by boasting, his new character for courage. +However fine the scene between Bessus and Arbaces, at the +conclusion of the third act, the darker and more infamous +shades of character there portrayed ought not to have been +delineated, as our contemptuous laughter is converted, during +the rest of the play, or, on a second perusal, into detestation +and horror. Bobadil, in Ben Jonson’s <hi rend="italic">Every Man in his +Humour</hi>, has generally been regarded as a copy of the Miles +Gloriosus; but the late editor of Jonson thinks him a creation +<hi rend="italic">sui generis</hi>, and perfectly original. <q>The soldiers of the +Roman stage,</q> he continues, <q>have not many traits in common +with Bobadil. Pyrgopolinices, and other captains with hard +names, are usually wealthy—all of them keep mistresses, and +some of them parasites—but Bobadil is poor. They are profligate +and luxurious—but Bobadil is stained with no inordinate +vice, and is so frugal, that a bunch of radishes, and a +pipe to close the orifice of his stomach, satisfy all his wants. +Add to this, that the vanity of the ancient soldier is accompanied +with such deplorable stupidity, that all temptation +to mirth is taken away, whereas Bobadil is really amusing. +His gravity, which is of the most inflexible nature, contrasts +admirably with the situations into which he is thrown; and +though beaten, baffled, and disgraced, he never so far forgets +himself as to aid in his own discomfiture. He has no soliloquies, +like Bessus and Parolles, to betray his real character, +and expose himself to unnecessary contempt: nor does he +break through the decorum of the scene in a single instance. +He is also an admirer of poetry, and seems to have a pretty +taste for criticism, though his reading does not appear very +extensive; and his decisions are usually made with somewhat +too much promptitude. In a word, Bobadil has many distinguishing +traits, and, till a preceding braggart shall be discovered, +with something more than big words and beating, to +characterize him, it may not be amiss to allow Jonson the +<pb n="138"/><anchor id="Pg138"/>credit of having depended on his own resources.</q> The character +of the braggart captain was continued in the Bernardo +of Shadwell’s <hi rend="italic">Amorous Bigot</hi>, and Nol Bluff, in Congreve’s <hi rend="italic">Old +Bachelor</hi>. These are persons who apparently would destroy +every thing with fire and sword; but their mischief is only in +their words, and they <q>will not swagger with a Barbary hen, +if her feathers turn back with any show of resistance.</q> The +braggarts, indeed, of modern dramatists, have been universally +represented as cowardly, from Spampana down to Captain +Flash. But cowardice is not a striking attribute of the +Miles Gloriosus of Plautus, at least it is not made the principal +source of ridicule as with the moderns. We have instead, a +vain conceit of his person, and his conviction that every woman +is in love with him. +</p> + +<p> +This feature in the character of the Miles Gloriosus, produces +a principal part in the intrigue of this amusing drama, +which properly commences at the second act, and is said, in +a prologue there introduced, to have been taken from the +Greek play <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Αλαζων</foreign><!--[Greek: Alazôn]-->. While residing at Athens, the captain had +purchased from her mother a young girl, (whose lover was at +that time absent on an embassy,) and had brought her with +him to his house at Ephesus. The lover’s slave entered into +the captain’s service, and, seeing the girl in his possession, +wrote to his former master, who, on learning the fate of his +mistress, repaired to Ephesus. There he went to reside with +Periplectomenes, a merry old bachelor, who had been a friend +of his father, and now agreed to assist him in recovering the +object of his affections. The house of Periplectomenes being +immediately adjacent to that of the captain, the ingenious +slave dug an opening between them; and the keeper, who had +been intrusted by the captain with charge of the damsel, was +thus easily persuaded by her rapid, and to him unaccountable, +transition from one building to the other, that it was a twin +sister, possessing an extraordinary resemblance to her, who +had arrived at the house of Periplectomenes. Afterwards, by +a new contrivance, a courtezan is employed to pretend that +she is the wife of Periplectomenes, and to persuade the captain +that she is in love with him. To facilitate this amour, he +allows the girl, whom he had purchased at Athens, to depart +with her twin sister and her lover, who had assumed the character +of the master of the vessel in which she sailed. The +captain afterwards goes to the house of Periplectomenes to a +supposed assignation, where he is seized and beat, but does +not discover how completely he had been duped, till the +Athenian girl had got clear off with her lover. +</p> + +<p> +This play must, in the representation, have been one of the +<pb n="139"/><anchor id="Pg139"/>most amusing of its author’s productions. The scenes are full +of action and bustle, while the secret communication between +the two houses occasions many lively incidents, and forms an +excellent <hi rend="italic">jeu de theatre</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +With regard to the characters, the one which gives title to +the play is, as already mentioned, quite extravagant; and no +modern reader can enjoy the rodomontade of the Miles Gloriosus, +or his credulity in listening with satisfaction to such +monstrous tales of his military renown and amorous success. +Flattery for potential qualities may be swallowed to any extent, +and a vain man may wish that others should be persuaded that +he had performed actions of which he is incapable; but no +man can himself hearken with pleasure to falsehoods which +he knows to be such, and which in the recital are not intended +to impose upon others. Pleusides, the lover in this drama, is +totally insipid and uninteresting, and we are not impressed +with a very favourable opinion of his mistress from the account +which is given of her near the beginning of the play:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Os habet, linguam, perfidiam, malitiam, atque audaciam,</q></l> +<l>Confidentiam, confirmitatem, fraudolentiam:</l> +<l>Qui arguet se, eum contra vincat jurejurando suo.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Domi habet animum falsiloquum, falsificum, falsijurium.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The principal character, the one which is best supported, and +which is indeed sustained with considerable humour, is that +of Periplectomenes, who is an agreeable old man, distinguished +by his frankness, jovial disposition, and abhorrence of matrimony. +There is one part of his conduct, however, which I +wish had been omitted, as it savours too much of cunning, and +reminds us too strongly of Ben Jonson’s Volpone. Talking of +his friends and relations, he says— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Me ad se, ad prandium, ad cœnam vocant.</q></l> +<l>Ille miserrimum se retur, minimum qui misit mihi.</l> +<l>Illi inter se certant donis; ego hæc mecum mussito:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Bona mea inhiant: certatim dona mittunt et munera.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +I have often thought that the character of Durazzo, in Massinger’s +<hi rend="italic">Guardian</hi>, was formed on that of Periplectomenes. +Like him, Durazzo is a jovial old bachelor, who aids his nephew +Caldoro in his amour with Calista. When the lover in +Plautus apologizes to his friend for having engaged him in an +enterprize so unsuitable to his years, he replies— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quid ais tu? itane tibi ego videor oppido Acheronticus,</q></l> +<l>Tam capularis; tamne tibi diu vita vivere?</l> +<l>Nam equidem haud sum annos natus præter quinquaginta et quatuor,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Clare oculis video, pernix sum manibus, sum pedes mobilis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="140"/><anchor id="Pg140"/> + +<p> +In like manner Durazzo exclaims— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 9"><q rend="post: none">My age! do not use</q></l> +<l>That word again; if you do, I shall grow young,</l> +<l>And swinge you soundly. I would have you know,</l> +<l>Though I write fifty odd, I do not carry</l> +<l>An almanack in my bones to predeclare</l> +<l>What weather we shall have; nor do I kneel</l> +<l>In adoration at the spring, and fall</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Before my doctor.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Periplectomenes boasts of his convivial talents, as also of his +amorous disposition, and his excellence at various exercises— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Et ego amoris aliquantum habeo, humorisque meo etiam in corpore:</q></l> +<l>Nequedum exarui ex amœnis rebus et voluptariis.</l> +<l> * * * *</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Tum ad saltandum non Cinædus magis usquam saltat quam ego.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This may be compared with the boast of Durazzo— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 9"><q rend="post: none">Bring me to a fence school,</q></l> +<l>And crack a blade or two for exercise;</l> +<l>Ride a barbed horse, or take a leap after me,</l> +<l>Following my hounds or hawks, and, (by your leave,)</l> +<l>At a gamesome mistress, you shall confess</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">I’m in the May of my abilities.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It may be perhaps considered as a confirmation of the above +conjecture concerning Massinger’s imitation of Plautus, that +the cook in the <hi rend="italic">Guardian</hi> is called Cario, which is also the +name of the cook of Periplectomenes. +</p> + +<p> +There is, however, a coincidence connected with this drama +of Plautus, which is much more curious and striking than its +resemblance to the <hi rend="italic">Guardian</hi> of Massinger. The plot of the +<hi rend="italic">Miles Gloriosus</hi> is nearly the same with the story of the <hi rend="italic">Two +Dreams</hi> related in the <hi rend="italic">Seven Wise Masters</hi>, a work originally +written by an Indian philosopher, long before the Christian +æra, and which, having been translated into Greek under the +title of <hi rend="italic">Syntipas</hi>, became current during the dark ages through +all the countries of Europe, by the different names of <hi rend="italic">Dolopatos</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Erastus</hi>, and <hi rend="italic">Seven Wise Masters</hi>,—the frame remaining +substantially the same, but the stories being frequently +adapted to the manners of different nations. In this popular +story-book the tale of the Two Dreams concerns a knight, and +a lady who was constantly confined by a jealous husband, in +a tower almost inaccessible. Having become mutually enamoured, +in consequence of seeing each other in dreams, the +knight repaired to the residence of the husband, by whom he +was hospitably received, and was at length allowed to build a +habitation on his possessions, at no great distance from the +<pb n="141"/><anchor id="Pg141"/>castle in which his wife was inclosed. When the building +was completed, the knight secretly dug a communication +under ground, between his new dwelling and the tower, by +which means he enjoyed frequent and uninterrupted interviews +with the object of his passion. At length the husband +was invited to an entertainment prepared at the knight’s residence, +at which his wife was present, and presided in the +character of the knight’s mistress. During the banquet the +husband could not help suspecting that she was his wife, and +in consequence he repaired, after the feast was over, to the +tower, where he found her sitting composedly in her usual +dress. This, and his confidence in the security of the tower, +the keys of which he constantly kept in his pocket, dispelled +his suspicions, and convinced him that the Beauty who had +done the honours of the knight’s table, had merely a striking +resemblance to his own lovely consort. Being thus gradually +accustomed to meet her at such entertainments, he at last +complied with his friend’s request, and kindly assisted at the +ceremony of the knight’s marriage with his leman. After their +union, he complacently attended them to the harbour, and +handed the lady to the vessel which the knight had prepared +for the elopement. This story also coincides with Le Chevalier + a la Trappe, one of the Fabliaux of the Norman Trouveurs<note place="foot">Le Grand, <hi rend="italic">Contes et Fabliaux</hi>, Tom. III. p. 157.</note>, +with a tale in the fourth part of the Italian <hi rend="italic">Novellino</hi> +of Massuccio Salernitano, and with the adventures of the +<hi rend="italic">Vieux Calender</hi>, in Gueulette’s <hi rend="italic">Contes Tartares</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Mercator</hi>—is one of the plays for which Plautus was indebted +to Philemon, the contemporary and the successful rival of +Menander, over whom he usually triumphed by the theatrical +suffrages, while contending for the prize of comedy. The +Roman critics unanimously concur in representing these +popular decisions as unjust and partial. But Quintilian, while +he condemns the perverted judgment of those who preferred +Philemon to Menander, acknowledges that he must be universally +admitted to have merited the next place to his great +rival.—<q>Qui ut pravis sui temporis judiciis Menandro sæpe + prælatus est, ita consensu tamen omnium meruit credi secundus<note place="foot">Quintil. <hi rend="italic">Inst. Orat.</hi> Lib. X, c. 1.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +An interesting account of Philemon is given in the <hi rend="italic">Observer</hi>, +by Cumberland, who has also collected the strange and inconsistent +stories concerning the manner of his death. He is +represented to us as having been a man of amiable character, +and cheerful disposition, seldom agitated by those furious +passions which distracted the mind of Menander. He lived +<pb n="142"/><anchor id="Pg142"/>to the extraordinary age of a hundred and one, during which +long period he wrote ninety comedies. Of these, the critics +and grammarians have preserved some fragments, which are +generally of a tender and sentimental, sometimes even of a +plaintive cast. Apuleius, however, informs us, that Philemon +was distinguished for the happiest strokes of wit and humour, +for the ingenious disposition of his plots, for his striking and +well managed discoveries, and the admirable adaptation of + his characters to their situations in life<note place="foot">Reperias, apud illum, multos sales, argumenta lepide inflexa, agnatos lucide + explicatos, personas rebus competentes; joca non infra Soccum—seria non usque + ad Cothurnum. Raræ apud illum corruptelæ; et uti errores concessi amores.—Apuleius, + <hi rend="italic">Florid.</hi> p. 553.</note>. To judge by the +Latin Mercator, imitated or translated from the <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Εμπορος</foreign><!--[Greek: Emporos]--> of +Philemon, it is impossible not to consider him as inferior to +those other Greek dramatists from whom Plautus borrowed his +<hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>, and <hi rend="italic">Miles Gloriosus</hi>; yet it +must be recollected, that those are the best comedies which +suffer most by a transfusion into another language. The +English Hypocrites and Misers would indeed be feeble records +of the genius of Moliere. Of one point, however, we may +clearly judge, even through the mist of translation. Notwithstanding +what is said by Apuleius concerning the purity of +Philemon’s dramas, in none of the plays of Plautus is greater +moral turpitude represented. A son is sent abroad by his +father, with the view of reclaiming him from the dissolute +course of life which he had followed. The youth, however, +is so little amended by his travels, that he brings a mistress +home in the ship with him. The father, seeing the girl, falls +in love with her. His son, in order to conceal his passion, +proposes to sell its object, but engages one of his acquaintances +to purchase her for him. By some mismanagement, +she is bought by a friend whom the father had employed for +this purpose, and is carried, as had been previously arranged, +to the purchaser’s house. The friend’s wife, however, being +jealous of this inmate, her husband is obliged to explain matters +for her satisfaction, and the old debauchee, in consequence, +incurs, before the conclusion of the comedy, merited +shame and reproach. +</p> + +<p> +An old libertine may be a very fit subject for satire and +ridicule, but in this play there is certainly too much latitude +allowed to the debaucheries of youth. The whole moral of +the drama is contained in three lines near the conclusion:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Neu quisquam posthac prohibeto adolescentem filium</q></l> +<l>Quin amet, et scortum ducat; quod bono fiat modo:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Si quis prohibuerit, plus perdet clam, quam si præhibuerit palam.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="143"/><anchor id="Pg143"/> + +<p> +Nothing can be more ridiculous than the delays and trifling +of the persons in this piece, under circumstances which must +naturally have excited their utmost impatience. Examples of +this occur in the scene which occupies nearly the whole of +the first act, between Charinus and his slave Acanthio, and +the equally tedious dialogue in the fifth act between Eutychus +and Charinus. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Mercator</hi> of Plautus is the origin of <hi rend="italic">La Stiava</hi>, an +Italian comedy by Cecchi; and in the second scene of the +second act, there are two lines which have a remarkable resemblance +to the conclusion of the celebrated speech of +Jaques, <q>All the world’s a stage,</q> in <hi rend="italic">As you Like it</hi>. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Senex cum extemplo est jam nec sentit, nec sapit.</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Aiunt solere eum rursum repuerascere.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi>,—which the English translator of Plautus has +rendered the Apparition,—represents a young Athenian, naturally +of a virtuous disposition, who, during the absence of his +father on a trading voyage, is led into every sort of vice and +extravagance, partly by his inordinate love for a courtezan, +and partly by the evil counsels of one of his slaves, called +Tranio. During an entertainment, which the youth is one +day giving in his father’s mansion, he is suddenly alarmed by +the accounts which Tranio brings, of the unexpected return +of the old man, whom he had just seen landing near the harbour. +At the same time, however, the slave undertakes to +prevent his entering the house. In prosecution of this design +he there locks up his young master and his guests, and, on the +approach of the old gentleman, gravely informs him that the +house was now shut up, in consequence of being haunted by +the apparition of an unfortunate man, long since murdered in +it by the person from whom it had been last purchased. Tranio +has scarcely prevailed on the father to leave the door of +the dwelling, when they unluckily meet a money-lender, who +had come to crave payment of a large debt from the profligate +son; but the ingenious slave persuades the father, that the +money had been borrowed to pay for a house which was a +great bargain, and which his son had bought in place of that +which was haunted. A new dilemma, however, arises, from +the old gentleman’s asking to see the house: Tranio artfully +obtains leave from the owner, who being obliged to go to the +Forum, nothing is said on this occasion with regard to the +sale. He examines the house a second time along with the +owner, but Tranio had previously begged him, as from motives +of delicacy, to say nothing concerning his purchase; and +<pb n="144"/><anchor id="Pg144"/>the whole passes as a visit, to what is called a Show-house. +The old man highly approves of the bargain; but at length +the whole deception is discovered, by his accidentally meeting +an attendant of one of his son’s companions, who is just going +into the haunted house to conduct his master home from that +scene of festivity. He has thus occasion to exercise all his +patience and clemency in forgiveness of the son by whom he +has been almost ruined, and of the slave by whom he had +been so completely duped. +</p> + +<p> +In this play, the character of the young man might have +been rendered interesting, had it been better brought out; +but it is a mere sketch. He is a grave and serious character, +hurried into extravagance by bad example, evil counsel, and +one fatal passion. A long soliloquy, in which he compares +human life to a house, reminds us, in its tone of feeling and sentiment, +of <q>All the world’s a stage.</q> The father seems a great +deal too foolish and credulous, and the slave must have relied +much on his weakness, when he ventured on such desperate +expedients, and such palpable lies. Slaves, it will already +have been remarked, are principal characters in many of the +dramas of Plautus; and a curious subject of inquiry is presented +in their insolence, effrontery, triumphant roguery, and +habitual familiarity with their masters at one moment, while +at the next they are threatened with the lash or crucifixion. +In Athens, however, where the prototype of this character +was found, the slave was treated by his master with much +more indulgence than the Spartan Helot, or any other slaves +in Greece. The masters themselves, who were introduced on +the ancient stage, were not in the first ranks of society; and +the vices which required the assistance of their slaves reduced +them to an equality. Besides, an Athenian or Roman master +could hardly be displeased with the familiarity of those who +were under such complete subjection; and the striking contrast +of their manners and situation would render their sallies +as poignant as the spirited remarks of Roxalana in the seraglio +of the Sultan. The character, too, gave scope for +those jests and scurrilities, which seem to have been indispensable +ingredients in a Roman comedy, but which would +be unsuitable in the mouths of more dignified persons. They +were, in fact, the buffoons of the piece, who avowed without +scruple their sensual inclinations and want of conscience; +for not only their impudence, but their frauds and deceptions, +seem to have been highly relished by the spectators. It is +evident that both the Greeks and Romans took peculiar pleasure +in seeing a witty slave cheat a covetous master, and that +the ingenuity of the fraud was always thought sufficient +<pb n="145"/><anchor id="Pg145"/>atonement for its knavery. Perhaps this unfortunate class of +men derived so few advantages from society, that they were +considered as entitled, at least on the stage, to break through +its ties. The character of a saucy and impudent slave had +been already portrayed in the old Greek comedy. In the +<hi rend="italic">Plutus</hi> of Aristophanes, Carion, the slave of Chremylus, is the +most prominent character, and is distinguished by freedom of +remark and witty impudence. To these attributes there was +added, in the new comedy, a spirit of roguery and intrigue: +and in this form the character was almost universally adopted +by the Latin dramatists. The slaves of Plautus correspond +to the valets—the Crispins, and Merlins of the French theatre, +whose race commenced with Merlin, in Scarron’s <hi rend="italic">Marquis +Ridicule</hi>. They were also introduced in Moliere’s earliest +pieces, but not in his best; and were in a great measure +dropped by his successors, as, in fact, they had ceased to be +the spring of any important event or intrigue in the world. +Indeed, I agree with M. Schlegel, in doubting if they could +ever have been introduced as happily on the modern as the +ancient stage. A wretch who was born in servitude, who was +abandoned for life to the capricious will of a master, and was +thus degraded below the dignity of man, might excite laughter +instead of indignation, though he did not conform to the +strictest precepts of honesty. He was placed in a state of +warfare with his oppressor, and cunning became his natural +arms. +</p> + +<p> +The French dramatist who has employed the character of +the intriguing valet to most advantage, is Regnard; to whom, +among many other agreeable pieces, we are indebted for a +delightful imitation of the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> of Plautus, entitled, <hi rend="italic">Le +Retour Imprevu, comedie en prose, et en une acte</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +In this play, the incidents of the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> have been in +general adopted, though they have been somewhat transposed. +We have the imposture of Merlin, who corresponds +with Plautus’s Tranio, as to the haunted house, and his subterfuge +when the usurer comes to claim the money which he +had lent. In place, however, of asking to see the new house, +the father proposes to deposit some merchandise in it. Merlin +then persuades him, that the lady to whom it formerly +belonged, and who had not yet quitted it, was unfortunately +deprived of reason, and, having been in consequence interdicted +by her relations from the use of her property, the house +had been exposed to sale. At the same time, the artful valet +finds an opportunity of informing the real owner, that the old +man had gone mad in consequence of having lost all his merchandise +at sea. Accordingly, when they meet, neither of +<pb n="146"/><anchor id="Pg146"/>them pays the smallest attention to what each considers the +raving of the other. Instead of a courtezan, Regnard has introduced +a young lady, with whom Clitandre is in love; but +he has given her the manners rather of a courtezan, than a +young lady. There is one incident mentioned in the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> +which is omitted in the <hi rend="italic">Retour Imprevu</hi>, and of which +even Plautus has not much availed himself, though it might +have been enlarged on, and improved to advantage: the old +man mentions, that he had met the person from whom he had +bought the haunted house, and that he had taxed him with +the murder of his guest, whose apparition still walked, but +that he had stoutly denied the charge. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Fantasmi</hi> of Ercole Bentivoglio, an Italian comedy of +the sixteenth century, is formed on the same original as the +<hi rend="italic">Retour Imprevu</hi>. The <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> has likewise suggested the +plot of an old tragi-comedy by Heywood, printed in 1633, +and entitled <hi rend="italic">The English Traveller</hi>. Fielding’s <hi rend="italic">Intriguing +Chambermaid</hi> is also derived from the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi>, but +through the medium of Regnard’s comedy. Indeed, it may +be considered as almost a translation from the French; except +that the author has most absurdly assigned the part of +the Latin Tranio, and French Merlin, to a chambermaid, +whom he calls Mrs Lettice, and has added a great number of +songs and <hi rend="italic">double entendres</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +It has been said, that the last act of Ben Johnson’s <hi rend="italic">Alchemist</hi>, +where Face, in order to conceal the iniquities committed +in his master’s house during his absence, tries to persuade +him, that it was shut up on account of being visited by an + apparition, has been suggested by the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi><note place="foot">Müller, <hi rend="italic">Einleitung zu Kenntniss der alten Lateinischen Schriftsteller</hi>, + Tom. II. p. 38.</note>; but, as +there is no resemblance between the two plays in other incidents, +we cannot be assured that the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> was at all +in the view of the great English dramatist. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Persa</hi>.—In this play, which belongs to the lowest order of +comedy, the characters are two slaves, a foot-boy of one of +these slaves, a parasite, a pander, and a courtezan, with her +waiting-maid. The manners represented are such as might +be expected from this respectable group. The incidents are +few and slight, hinging almost entirely on a deceit practised +against the pander, who is persuaded to give a large sum for +a free woman, whom the slaves had dressed up as an Arabian +captive, and whom he was obliged to relinquish after having +paid the money. The fable is chiefly defective from the trick +of the slaves being intended to serve their own purposes. +<pb n="147"/><anchor id="Pg147"/>But such devices are interesting only when undertaken for +the advantage of higher characters; a comedy otherwise must +degenerate into farce. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Pœnulus</hi>, (the Carthaginian,) is one of the longest, and, I +think, on the whole, the dullest of Plautus’ performances. It +turns on the discovery of a lost child, who had been stolen +from her Carthaginian parents in infancy, and had been carried +to Greece. In none of those numerous plays which turn +on the recognition of lost children, has Plautus ever exhibited +an affecting interview, or even hit on an expression of natural +tenderness. The characters are either not brought on the +stage at the conclusion, and we are merely told by some slave +or parasite that the discovery had taken place: or, as in the +instance of Hanno and his daughter in the present drama, the +parties most interested teaze and torment each other with +absurd questions, instead of giving way to any species of +emotion. It is a high example, however, of the noble and +generous spirit of the Romans, that Hanno, the Carthaginian +introduced in this play, which was represented in the course +of the Punic wars, is more amiable than almost any other +character in Plautus. It is evident, from his quibbles and +obscene jests, that the Latin dramatist adapted his plays to +the taste of the vulgar; and if the picture of a villainous or +contemptible Carthaginian could have pleased the Roman +public, as the Jew of Malta gratified the prejudices of an +English mob, Plautus would not have hesitated to accommodate +himself to such feelings, and his Hanno would doubtless +have appeared in those hateful colours in which the Jews, or +in that ridiculous light in which the French, have usually been +exhibited on the British stage. +</p> + +<p> +The employment of different dialects, or idioms, which has +been so great a resource of the modern comic muse, particularly +on the Italian stage, had been early resorted to in Greece. +Aristophanes, in one of his comedies, introduced the jargon +of a woman of Lacedæmon, where the Doric dialect was +spoken in its rudest form. Plautus, in a scene of the <hi rend="italic">Pœnulus</hi>, +has made his Carthaginian speak in his native language; +and as the Carthaginian tongue was but little known in Greece, +it may be presumed that this scene was invented by Plautus +himself. +</p> + +<p> +Those remains of the Punic language which have been +preserved, (though probably a good deal corrupted,) are regarded +as curious vestiges of philological antiquity, and have +afforded ample employment for the critics, who have laboured +to illustrate and restore them to the right readings. Commentators +have found in them traces of all the ancient tongues, +<pb n="148"/><anchor id="Pg148"/>according to their own fancy, or some favourite system they +had adopted. Joseph Scaliger considered them as little removed + from the purity of original Hebrew<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> 362.</note>; and Pareus, in +his edition of Plautus, printed them in Hebrew characters, as + did Bochart, in his <hi rend="italic">Phaleg et Canaan</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Opera</hi>, Vol. I. p. 721.</note>. Others, from the +resemblance of single letters, or syllables, have found in different + words the Chinese, Ethiopian, Persian, or Coptic dialects<note place="foot">See on this subject three German Programmata by M. Bellermann, published + 1806, 7, 8; also Schoell, <hi rend="italic">Hist. Abregée de la Litter. Rom.</hi> Tom. I. p. 123.—Col. + Vallancey, in his <hi rend="italic">Essay on the Antiquity of the Irish Language</hi>, (which attracted + considerable attention on its first publication, and has been recently reprinted,) + attempted to show the affinity between these Punic remains and the old Irish language,—both, according to him, having been derived from the Phœnician, which was itself a dialect of the Hebrew.</note>. +Plautus, it is well known, had considerable knowledge +of languages. Besides writing his own with the greatest +purity, he was well acquainted with Greek, Persian, and Punic. +The editor of the Delphin Plautus has a notable conjecture +on this point: He supposes that in the mill in which Plautus +laboured, (as if it had been a large mill on the modern construction,) +there was a Carthaginian, a Greek, and a Persian +slave, from whom alternately he acquired a knowledge of these +tongues in the hours of relaxation from work! +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Pseudolus</hi>—is one of those plays of Plautus which hinge on +the contrivance of a slave in behalf of his young master, who +is represented at the commencement of the play, as in despair +at not having money sufficient to redeem his mistress, just then +sold by Ballio, a slave-dealer, to a Macedonian captain for +twenty <hi rend="italic">minæ</hi>. Fifteen of these had been paid, and the girl +was to be delivered up to him as soon as he sent the remaining +five, along with an impression of a seal-ring, which the captain +had left behind as a pledge. Pseudolus, the slave, having +encountered the captain’s messenger, on his way to deliver a +letter containing the token and the balance of the stipulated +price, personates the pander’s servant, and is in consequence +intrusted with the letter. While the messenger is refreshing +himself at a tavern, Pseudolus persuades one of his fellow-slaves +to assume the character of the captain’s emissary, and +to present the credentials (which Pseudolus places in his +possession) to the pander, who immediately acknowledges +their authenticity, and, without hesitation, delivers up the girl +in return. When the real messenger afterwards arrives, the +slave-merchant treats him as an impostor hired by Pseudolus. +</p> + +<p> +Next to the slave, the principal character in this comedy is +that of the pander, which is sketched with the strong pencil +<pb n="149"/><anchor id="Pg149"/>of a master, and is an admirable representation of that last +stage of human depravity and wretchedness, in which even +appearances cease to be preserved with the world, and there +exists no longer any feeling or anxiety concerning the opinion +of others. Calidorus, the lover of the girl, upbraids him for +his breach of faith— +</p> + +<lg> +<l><q rend="post: none">Juravistine te illam nulli venditurum nisi mihi?</q></l> +<l><hi rend="italic">Ballio.</hi> Fateor. <hi rend="italic">Cal.</hi> Nempe conceptis verbis. <hi rend="italic">Bal.</hi> Etiam consultis quoque.</l> +<l><hi rend="italic">Cal.</hi> Perjuravisti, sceleste. <hi rend="italic">Bal.</hi> At argentum intro condidi:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ego scelestus nunc argentum promere possum domo.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +M. Dacier, however, is of a different opinion with regard +to the merit of this character. He thinks that the <hi rend="italic">Pseudolus</hi>, +though mentioned by Cato in Cicero’s Dialogue <hi rend="italic">De Senectute</hi>, + as a finished piece which greatly delighted its author<note place="foot">C. 14.</note>, and +though called, by one of his commentators, <hi rend="italic">Ocellus Fabularum + Plauti</hi><note place="foot">G. Dousa, <hi rend="italic">Centur.</hi> Lib. III. c. 2.</note> was chiefly in Horace’s view when he spoke, in his +<hi rend="italic">Epistles</hi>, of Plautus’ want of success in the characters of a +young passionate lover, a parsimonious father, and a cunning +pimp,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 10">—— <q rend="post: none">Aspice, Plautus</q></l> +<l>Quo pacto partes tutetur amantis ephebi,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ut patris attenti, lenonis ut insidiosi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These three characters all occur in this comedy; and Dacier +maintains that they are very poorly supported by the poet.—Calidorus +is a young lover, but his character (says the critic,) +is so cold and lifeless, that he hardly deserves the name. His +father, Simo, corresponds as little to the part of the <hi rend="italic">Patris +attenti</hi>; for he encourages the slave to deceive himself, and +promises him a recompense if he succeed in over-reaching +the slave-merchant, and placing in the hands of his son the +girl on whom he doated. Ballio, the slave-dealer, so far +from sustaining the character <hi rend="italic">lenonis insidiosi</hi>, who should +deceive every one, very foolishly becomes the dupe of a lying + valet<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Œuvres D’Horace, par Dacier</hi>, Tom. IX. p. 93. Ed. 1727</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The scene between Calidorus and the pander, from which +some lines are extracted above, and that by which it is preceded, +where Ballio gives directions to his slaves, seem to +have suggested two scenes in Sir Richard Steele’s comedy of +the <hi rend="italic">Funeral</hi>. The play has been more closely imitated by +Baptista Porta, the celebrated author of the Magia Naturalis +in <hi rend="italic">La Trappolaria</hi>, one of the numerous plays with the com<pb n="150"/><anchor id="Pg150"/>position of which he amused his leisure, after the mysteries +and chimeras of his chief work had excited the suspicion of +the court of Rome, and he was in consequence prohibited +from holding those assemblies of learned men, who repaired +to his house with their newly discovered secrets in medicine +and other arts. His play, which was first printed at Bergamo +in 1596, is much more complicated in its incidents than the +Latin original. Trappola, the Pseudolus of the piece, feigns +himself, as in Plautus, to be the pander’s slave, and persuades +a parasite to act the part of the pander himself: By this stratagem, +the parasite receives from the captain’s servant the +stipulated money and tokens, but delivers to him in return +his ugly wife Gabrina, as the Beauty he was to receive; and +there follows a comical scene, produced by the consequent +amazement and disappointment of the captain. The parasite +then personates the captain’s servant, and, by means of the +credentials of which he had possessed himself, obtains the +damsel Filesia, whom he carries to her lover. With this plot, +chiefly taken from Plautus, another series of incidents, invented +by the Italian dramatist, is closely connected. The father +of the young lover, Arsenio, had left his wife in Spain; and +also another son, who had married there, and exactly resembled +his brother in personal appearance. Arsenio being +ordered by his father to sail from Naples, where the scene is +laid, for Spain, in order to convey home his relatives in that +country, and being in despair at the prospect of this separation +from his mistress, the father is persuaded, by a device of +the cheat Trappola, that he had not proceeded on the voyage, +as his brother had already arrived. Availing himself of his +resemblance, Arsenio personates his Spanish brother, and +brings his mistress as his wife to his father’s house, where she +remains protected, in spite of the claims of the captain and +pander, till the whole artifice is discovered by the actual +arrival of the old lady from Spain. Arsenio’s mistress being +then strictly questioned, proves to be a near connection of the +family, who had been carried off in childhood by corsairs, and +she is now, with the consent of all, united to her lover. +</p> + +<p> +There is also a close imitation of the incidents of the <hi rend="italic">Pseudolus</hi> +in Moliere’s <hi rend="italic">Etourdi</hi>, which turns on the stratagems of +a valet to place a girl in possession of his master Lelie. His + first device, as already mentioned, was suggested by the Epidicus<note place="foot">See above, <ref target="Pg129">p. 129</ref>.</note>; +but this having failed, he afterwards contrives to get +into the service of his master’s rival, Leander, who, having +purchased the girl from the proprietor, had agreed to send a +<pb n="151"/><anchor id="Pg151"/>ring as a token, at sight of which she was to be delivered up. +The valet receives the ring for this very purpose, carries it to +the owner, and by such means is just on the point of obtaining +possession of the girl, when his stratagem, as usual, is +defeated by the <hi rend="italic">etourderie</hi> of his master. This notion of the +valet’s best-laid plans being always counteracted, was probably +suggested by the <hi rend="italic">Bacchides</hi> of Plautus, where Mnesilochus +repeatedly frustrates the well-contrived schemes of his slave +Chrysalus; though, perhaps through the medium of the <hi rend="italic">Inavertito</hi> +of the Italian dramatist, Nicolo Barbieri, printed in +1629, or Quinault’s <hi rend="italic">Amant Indiscret</hi>, which was acted four +years before Moliere’s <hi rend="italic">Etourdi</hi>, and is founded on the same +plan with that drama. In the particular incidents the <hi rend="italic">Etourdi</hi> +is compounded of the tricks of Plautus’ slaves; but Moliere has +shown little judgment in thus heaping them on each other in +one piece. Such events might occur once, but not six or +seven times, to the same person. In fact, the valet is more +of an <hi rend="italic">Etourdi</hi> than his master, as he never forewarns him of +his plans; and we feel as we advance, that the play could not +be carried on without a previous concert among the characters +to connive at impossibilities, and to act in defiance of all +common sense or discretion. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi>.—This play, which is taken from a Greek comedy +of Diphilus, has been called <hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi> by Plautus, from the rope +or cable whereby a fisherman drags to shore a casket which +chiefly contributes to the solution of the fable. In the prologue, +which is spoken by Arcturus, we are informed of the +circumstances which preceded the opening of the drama, and +the situation in which the characters were placed at its commencement. +Plautus has been frequently blamed by the +critics for the fulness of his preliminary expositions, as tending +to destroy the surprise and interest of the succeeding +scenes. But I think he has been unjustly censured, even with +regard to those prologues, where, as in that of the <hi rend="italic">Pœnulus</hi>, +he has anticipated the incidents, and revealed the issue of the +plot. The comedies of Plautus were intended entirely for +exhibition on the public stage, and not for perusal in the +closet. The great mass of the Roman people in his age was +somewhat rude: They had not been long accustomed to dramatic +representations, and would have found it difficult to +follow an intricate plot without a previous exposition. This, +indeed, was not necessary in tragedies. The stories of Agamemnon +and Œdipus, with other mythical subjects, so frequently +dramatized by Ennius and Livius Andronicus, were +sufficiently known; and, as Dryden has remarked, <q>the people, +as soon as they heard the name of Œdipus, knew as well as +<pb n="152"/><anchor id="Pg152"/>the poet that he had killed his father by mistake, and committed +incest with his mother; that they were now to hear of + a great plague, an oracle, and the ghost of Laius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Essay on Dramatic Poetry</hi>.</note>.</q> It was +quite different, however, in those new inventions which formed +the subjects of comedies, and in which the incidents would +have been lost or misunderstood without some introductory +explanation. The attention necessary to unravel a plot prevents +us from remarking the beauties of sentiment or poetry, +and draws off our attention from humour or character, the +chief objects of legitimate comedy. We often read a new +play, or one with which we are not acquainted, before going +to see it acted. Surprise, which is everything in romance, is +the least part of the drama. Our horror at the midnight +murders of Macbeth, and our laughter at the falsehoods and +facetiousness of Falstaff, are not diminished, but increased, +by knowing the issue of the crimes of the one, and the genial +festivity of the other. In fact, the sympathy and pleasure so +often derived from our knowledge outweighs the gratification +of surprise. The Athenians were well aware that Jocasta, in +the celebrated drama of Sophocles, was the mother of Œdipus; +but the knowledge of this fact, so far from abating the + concern of the spectators, as Dryden supposes<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Essay on Dramatic Poetry</hi>.</note>, must have +greatly contributed to increase the horror and interest excited +by the representation of that amazing tragedy. The celebrated +scene of <hi rend="italic">Iphigenia in Tauris</hi>, between Electra and +Orestes, the masterpiece of poetic art and tragic pathos, +would lose half its effect if we were not aware that Orestes +was the brother of Electra, and if this were reserved as a discovery +to surprise the spectators. Indeed, so convinced of +all this were the Greek dramatists, that, in many of their plays, +as the <hi rend="italic">Hecuba</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Hippolytus</hi> of Euripides, the issue of the +drama is announced at its commencement. +</p> + +<p> +But, be this as it may, the prologue itself, which is prefixed +to the <hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi>, is eminently beautiful. Arcturus descends +as a star from heaven, and opens the piece, somewhat in the +manner of the Angel who usually delivers the prologue in the +ancient Italian mysteries—of the Mercury who frequently +recites it in the early secular dramas, and the Attendant Spirit +in the Masque of Comus, who, by way of prologue, declares +his office, and the mission which called him to earth. In a +manner more consistent with oriental than with either Greek +or Roman mythology, Arcturus represents himself as mingling +with mankind during day, in order to observe their actions, +<pb n="153"/><anchor id="Pg153"/>and as presenting a record of their good and evil deeds to Jupiter, +whom the wicked in vain attempt to appease by sacrifice— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Atque hoc scelesti in animum inducunt suum,</q></l> +<l>Jovem se placare posse donis, hostiis:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Et operam et sumptum perdunt.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Arcturus having thus satisfactorily accounted for his knowledge +of the incidents of the drama, proceeds to unfold the +situation of the principal characters. Dæmones, before whose +house in Cyrene the scene is laid, had formerly resided at +Athens, where his infant daughter had been kidnapped, and +had been afterwards purchased by a slave merchant, who +brought her to Cyrene. A Greek youth, then living in that +town, had become enamoured of her, and having agreed to +purchase her, the merchant had consented to meet him and +fulfil the bargain at an adjacent temple. But being afterwards +persuaded that he could procure a higher price for +her in Sicily, the slave-dealer secretly hired a vessel, and set +sail, carrying the girl along with him. The ship had scarcely +got out to sea when it was overtaken by a dreadful tempest +over which Arcturus is figured as presiding. The play opens +during the storm, in a manner eminently beautiful and romantic—an +excellence which none of the other plays of +Plautus possess. Dæmones and his servant are represented +as viewing the tempest from land, and pointing out to each +other the dangers and various vicissitudes of a boat, in which +were seated two damsels who had escaped from the ship, and +were trying to gain the shore, which, after many perils, they +at length reached. The decorations of this scene are said +to have been splendid, and disposed in a very <anchor id="corr153"/><corr sic="picturesqe">picturesque</corr> +manner. Madame Dacier conjectures, <q>that at the farther +end of the stage was a prospect of the sea, intersected by +many rocks and cliffs, which projected considerably forward +on the stage. On one side the city of Cyrene was represented +as at a distance; on the other, the temple of Venus, with a +court before it, in the centre of which stood an altar. Adjacent +to the temple, and on the same side, was the house of +Dæmones, with some scattered cottages in the back ground.</q> +Pleusidippus, the lover, comes forward to the temple during +the storm, and then goes off in search of Labrax, the slave-merchant, +who had likewise escaped from the shipwreck. The +damsels, whose situation is highly interesting, having now got +on shore, appear among the cliffs, and after having deplored +their misfortunes, they are received into the temple by the +<pb n="154"/><anchor id="Pg154"/>priestess of Venus, who reminds them, however, that they +should have come clothed in white garments and bringing +victims! Here they are discovered by the slave of Pleusidippus, +who goes to inform his master. Labrax then approaches +to the vicinity of the temple of Venus, and having +discovered that the damsels who had saved themselves from +the wreck were secreted there, he rushes in to claim and +seize them. Thus far the play is lively and well conducted, +but the subsequent scenes are too long protracted. They +are full of trifling, and are more loaded than those of any other +comedy of Plautus, with quaint conceits, the quibbling witticisms, +and the scurrilities of slaves. The scene in which +Labrax attempts to seize the damsels at the altar, and Dæmones +protects them, is insufferably tedious, but terminates at +length with the pander being dragged to prison. After this, +the fisherman of Dæmones is introduced, congratulating himself +on having found a wallet which had been lost from the +pander’s ship, and contained his money, as well as some +effects belonging to the damsels. The ridiculous schemes +which he proposes, and the future grandeur he anticipates in +consequence of his good fortune, is an excellent satire on the +fantastic projects of those who are elevated with a sudden +success. Having been observed, however, by the servant of +Pleusidippus, who suspected that this wallet contained articles +by which Palæstra might discover her parents, a long +contest for its possession ensues between them, which might +be amusing in the representation, but is excessively tiresome +in perusal. This may be also remarked of the scene where +their dispute is referred to the arbitration of Dæmones, who +apparently is chosen umpire for no other reason than because +this was necessary to unravel the plot. Dæmones discovers, +from the contents of the wallet, that Palæstra is his daughter. +The principal interest being thus exhausted, the remaining +scenes become more and more tedious. We feel no great +sympathy with the disappointment of the fisherman, and take +little amusement in the bargain which he drives with the +pander for the restoration of the gold, or his stipulation with +his master for a reward, on account of the important service +he had been instrumental in rendering him. +</p> + +<p> +This play has been imitated by Ludovico Dolce, in his comedy +<hi rend="italic">Il Ruffiano</hi>, which was published in 1560, and which, +the author says in his prologue, was <q><hi rend="italic">vestita di habito antico, +e ridrizzato alla forma moderna</hi>.</q> The <hi rend="italic">Ruffiano</hi> is not a mere +translation from the Latin: the language and names are altered, +and the scenes frequently transposed. There is likewise +introduced the additional character of the old man <anchor id="corr154"/><corr sic="Lucretio.">Lucretio,</corr> +<pb n="155"/><anchor id="Pg155"/>father to the lover; also his lying valet Tagliacozzo, and his +jealous wife Simona. Lucretio comes from Venice to the +town where the scene of the play is laid, to recover a son who +had left home in quest of a girl in the possession of Secco the +Ruffiano. The first act is occupied with the details of Lucretio’s +family misfortunes, and it is only in the commencement +of the second act that the shipwreck and escape of the damsels +are introduced, so that the play opens in a way by no means +so interesting and picturesque as the <hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi> of Plautus. The +women having taken refuge in a church, Lucretio offers them +shelter in his own house, which exposes them to the rage of +his jealous wife Simona. By the assistance, however, of one +of these girls, he discovers his lost son, who was her lover; +and the recognition of the damsel herself as daughter of Isidoro, +who corresponds to the Dæmones of Plautus, is then +brought about in the same manner as in the Latin original, and +gives rise to the same tedious and selfish disputes among the +inferior characters. Madame Riccoboni has also employed +the <hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi> in her comedy <hi rend="italic">Le Naufrage</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Stichus</hi>—is so called from a slave, who is a principal character +in the comedy. The subject is the continued determination +of two ladies to persist in their constancy to their husbands, +who, from their long absence, without having been +heard of, were generally supposed to be dead. In this resolution +they remain firm, in spite of the urgency of their fathers +to make them enter into second marriages, till at length their +conjugal fidelity is rewarded by the safe arrival of their consorts. +It would appear that Plautus had not found this subject +sufficient to form a complete play; he has accordingly +filled up the comic part of the drama with the carousal of +Stichus and his fellow slaves, and the stratagems of the parasite +Gelasimus, in order to be invited to the entertainments +which the husbands prepared in honour of their return. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Trinummus</hi>—is taken from the <hi rend="italic">Thesaurus</hi> of Philemon; +but Plautus has changed the original title into Trinummus—a +jocular name given to himself by one of the characters hired +to carry on a deception, for which he had received three pieces +of money, as his reward. The prologue is spoken by two +allegorical personages, Luxury, and her daughter Want, the +latter of whom had been commissioned by her mother to take +up her residence in the house of the prodigal youth Lesbonicus. +The play is then opened by a Protatick person, as he is called, +who comes to chide his friend Callicles for behaviour which +appeared to him in some points incomprehensible; in consequence +of which the person accused explains his conduct at +once to the spectators and his angry monitor. It seems Char<pb n="156"/><anchor id="Pg156"/>mides, an Athenian, being obliged to leave his own country +on business of importance, intrusted the guardianship of his +son and daughter to his friend Callicles. He had also confided +to him the management of his affairs, particularly the care of +a treasure which was secreted in a concealed part of his dwelling. +Lesbonicus, the son of Charmides, being a dissolute +youth, had put up the family mansion to sale, and his guardian, +in order that the treasure entrusted to him might not pass into +other hands, had purchased the house at a low price. Meanwhile +a young man, called Lysiteles, had fallen in love with +the daughter of Charmides, and obtained the consent of her +brother to his marriage. Her guardian was desirous to give +her a portion from the treasure, but does not wish to reveal +the secret to her extravagant brother. The person calling himself +Trinummus is therefore hired to pretend that he had come +as a messenger from the father—to present a forged letter to +the son and to feign that he had brought home money for the +daughter’s portion. While Trinummus is making towards the +house, to commence performance of his part, Charmides arrives +unexpectedly from abroad, and seeing this Counterfeit +approaching his house, immediately accosts him. A highly +comic scene ensues, in which the hireling talks of his intimacy +with Charmides, and also of being entrusted with his letters +and money; and when Charmides at length discovers himself, +he treats him as an impostor. The entrance of Charmides into +his house is the simple solution of this plot, of which the <hi rend="italic">nodus</hi> +is neither very difficult nor ingenious. This meagre subject +is filled up with an amicable contest between Lesbonicus and +his sister’s lover, concerning her portion,—the latter generously +offering to take her without dowry, and the former refusing +to give her away on such ignominious terms. +</p> + +<p> +The English translators of Plautus have remarked, that the +art of the dramatist in the conduct of this comedy is much to +be admired:—<q>The opening of it,</q> they observe, <q rend="post: none">is highly +interesting; the incidents naturally arise from each other, and +the whole concludes happily with the reformation of Lesbonicus, +and the marriage of Lysiteles. It abounds with excellent +moral reflections, and the same may be said of it with +equal justice as of the <hi rend="italic">Captives</hi>:—</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><q>Ad pudicos mores facta est hæc fabula.</q></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +On the other hand, none of Plautus’ plays is more loaded with +improbabilities of that description into which he most readily +falls. Thus Stasimus, the slave of Lesbonicus, in order to +save a farm which his master proposed giving as a portion to +<pb n="157"/><anchor id="Pg157"/>his sister, persuades the lover’s father that a descent to Acheron +opened from its surface,—that the cattle which fed on it fell +sick,—and that the owners themselves, after a short period, +invariably died or hanged themselves. In order to introduce +the scene between Charmides and the Counterfeit, the former, +though just returned from a sea voyage and a long absence, +waits in the street, on the appearance of a stranger, merely +from curiosity to know his business; and in the following scene +the slave Stasimus, after expressing the utmost terror for the +lash on account of his tarrying so long, still loiters to propound +a series of moral maxims, inconsistent with his character +and situation. +</p> + +<p> +The plot of the <hi rend="italic">Dowry</hi> of Giovam-maria Cecchi is precisely +the same with that of the <hi rend="italic">Trinummus</hi>; but that dramatist +possessed a wonderful art of giving an air of originality to his +closest imitations, by the happy adaptation of ancient subjects +to Italian manners. The <hi rend="italic">Tresor Caché</hi> of Destouches is almost +translated from the <hi rend="italic">Trinummus</hi>, only he has brought +forward on the stage Hortense, the Prodigal’s sister, and has +added the character of Julie, the daughter of the absent father’s +friend, of whom the Prodigal himself is enamoured. In +this comedy the character of the two youths are meant to be +contrasted, and are more strongly brought out in the imitation, +from both of them being in love. A German play, entitled +<hi rend="italic">Schatz</hi>, by the celebrated dramatist Lessing, is also borrowed +from this Latin original. The scene, too, in <hi rend="italic">Trinummus</hi>, between +Charmides and the counterfeit messenger, has given rise +to one in the <hi rend="italic">Suppositi</hi> of Ariosto, and through that medium +to another in Shakspeare’s <hi rend="italic">Taming of the Shrew</hi>, where, when +it is found necessary for the success of Lucentio’s stratagem at +Padua, that some one should personate his father, the <hi rend="italic">pedant</hi> +is employed for this purpose. Meanwhile, the father himself +unexpectedly arrives at Padua, and a comical scene in consequence +passes between them. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Truculentus</hi>—is so called from a morose and clownish +servant, who, having accompanied his master from the country +to Rome, inveighs against the depraved morals of that city, +and especially against Phronesium, the courtezan by whom his +master had been enticed. His churlish disposition, however, +is only exhibited in a single scene. On the sole other occasion +on which he is introduced, he is represented as having become +quite mild and affable. For this change no reason is assigned, +but it is doubtless meant to be understood that he had meanwhile +been soothed and wheedled by the arts of some courtezan. +The characters, however, of the Truculentus and his +rustic master, have little to do with the main plot of the drama, +<pb n="158"/><anchor id="Pg158"/>which is chiefly occupied with the fate of the lovers, whom +Phronesium enticed to their ruin. When she had consumed +the wealth of the infatuated Dinarchus, she lays her snares +for Stratophanes, the Babylonian captain, to whom she pretends +to have borne a son, in order that she may prey on him +with more facility. This drama is accordingly occupied with +her feigned pregnancy, her counterfeited solicitude, and her +search for a supposititious child, to which she persuades her +dupe that she had given birth, but which afterwards proves to +be the child of her former lover Dinarchus, by a young lady +to whom he had been betrothed. +</p> + +<p> +In the first act of this play an account is given of the mysteries +of a courtezan’s occupation, which, with a passage near +the commencement of the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi>, and a few fragments of +Alexis, a writer of the middle comedy, gives us some insight +into the practices by which they entrapped and seduced, their +lovers, by whom they appear to have been maintained in prodigious +state and splendour. In a play of Terence, one of the +characters, talking of the train of a courtezan, says, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 15"><q rend="post: none">Ducitur familia tota,</q></l> +<l>Vestispicæ, unctor, auri custos, flabelliferæ, sandaligerulæ,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Cantrices, cistellatrices, nuncii, renuncii<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Heautontim.</hi> Act III. sc. 2.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The Greek courtezan possessed attainments, which the more +virtuous of her sex were neither expected nor permitted to +acquire. On her the education which was denied to a spotless +woman, was carefully bestowed. To sing, to dance, to play +on the lyre and the lute, were accomplishments in which the +courtezan was, from her earliest years, completely instructed. +The habits of private life afforded ample opportunity for the +display of such acquirements, as the charm of convivial meetings +among the Greeks was thought imperfect, unless the +enjoyments were brightened by a display of the talents which +belonged exclusively to the Wanton. But though these refinements +alone were sufficient to excite the highest admiration +of the Greek youth, unaccustomed as they were to female +society, and often procured a splendid establishment for the +accomplished courtezan, some of that class embraced a much +wider range of education; and having added to their attainments +in the fine arts, a knowledge of philosophy and the +powers of eloquence, they became, thus trained and educated, +the companions of orators, statesmen, and poets. The arrival +of Aspasia at Athens is said to have produced a change in the +manners of that city, and to have formed a new and remark<pb n="159"/><anchor id="Pg159"/>able epoch in the history of society. The class to which she +belonged was of more political importance in Athens than in +any other state of Greece; and though I scarcely believe that +the Peloponnesian war had its origin in the wrongs of Aspasia, +the Athenian courtezans, with their various interests, were +often alluded to in grave political harangues, and they were +considered as part of the establishment of the state. Above +all, the comic poets were devoted to their charms, were conversant +with their manners, and often experienced their rapacity +and infidelity; for, being unable to support them in their +habits of expense, an opulent old man, or dissolute youth, +was in consequence frequently preferred. The passion of +Menander for Glycerium is well known, and Diphilus, from +whom Plautus borrowed his <hi rend="italic">Rudens</hi>, consorted with Gnathena, +celebrated as one of the most lively and luxurious of Athenian + Charmers<note place="foot">Athenæus, Lib. XIII. Alciphron’s <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi></note>. Accordingly, many of the plays of the new comedy +derive their names from celebrated courtezans; but it +does not appear, from the fragments which remain, that they +were generally represented in a favourable light, or in their + meridian splendour of beauty and accomplishments<note place="foot">De Pauw, <hi rend="italic">Recherches Philosophiques sur les Grecs</hi>, Vol. I. p. 188.</note>. In the +Latin plays, the courtezans are not drawn so highly gifted in +point of talents, or even beauty, as might be expected; but it +was necessary to paint them as elegant, fascinating, and expensive, +in order to account for the infatuation and ruin of +their lovers. The Greeks and Romans were alike strangers +to the polite gallantry of Modern Europe, and to the enthusiastic +love which chivalry is said to have inspired in the middle +ages. Thus their hearts and senses were left unprotected, to +become the prey of such women as the Phronesium of the +<hi rend="italic">Truculentus</hi>, who is a picture of the most rapacious and debauched +of her class, and whose vices are neither repented of, +nor receive punishment, at the conclusion of the drama. Dinarchus +may be regarded as a representation of the most profligate +of the Greek or Roman youth, yet he is not held up to +any particular censure; and, in the end, he is neither reformed +nor adequately punished. The portion, indeed, of the lady +whom he had violated, and at last agrees to espouse, is threatened +by her father to be diminished, but this seems merely +said in a momentary fit of resentment. +</p> + +<p> +This play, with all its imperfections, is said to have been a + great favourite of the author<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">de Senectute</hi>, c. 14.</note>; and was a very popular comedy +at Rome. It has descended to us rather in a mutilated +state, which may, perhaps, have deprived us of some fine sen<pb n="160"/><anchor id="Pg160"/>tences or witticisms, which the ancients had admired; for, as +a French translator of Plautus has remarked, their approbation +could scarcely have been founded on the interest of the subject, +the disposition of the incidents, or the moral which is +inculcated. +</p> + +<p> +The character of Lolpoop, the servant of Belfond Senior, +in Shadwell’s <hi rend="italic">Squire of Alsatia</hi>, has been evidently formed +on that of the Truculentus, in this comedy. His part, however, +as in the original, is chiefly episodical; and the principal +plot, as shall be afterwards shown, has been founded on the +<hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> of Terence. +</p> + +<p> +The above-mentioned plays are the twenty dramas of Plautus, +which are still extant. But, besides these, a number of +comedies, now lost, have been attributed to him. Aulus + Gellius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. III. c. 3.</note> mentions, that there were about a hundred and +thirty plays, which, in his age, passed under the name of +Plautus; and of these, nearly forty titles, with a few scattered +fragments, still remain. From the time of Varro to that +of Aulus Gellius, it seems to have been a subject of considerable +discussion what plays were genuine; and it appears, that +the best informed critics had come to the conclusion, that a +great proportion of those comedies, which vulgarly passed for +the productions of Plautus, were spurious. Such a vast number +were probably ascribed to him, from his being the head +and founder of a great dramatic school; so that those pieces, +which he had perhaps merely retouched, came to be wholly +attributed to his pen. As in the schools of painting, so in +the dramatic art, a celebrated master may have disciples who +adopt his principles. He may give the plan which they fill +up, or complete what they have imperfectly executed. Many +paintings passed under the name of Raphael, of which Julio +Romano, and others, were the chief artists. <q>There is no +doubt,</q> says Aulus Gellius, <q>but that those plays, which seem +not to have been written by Plautus, but are ascribed to him, +were by certain ancient poets, and afterwards retouched and + polished by him<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. III. c. 3.</note>.</q> Even those comedies which were written +in the same taste with his, came to be termed <hi rend="italic">Fabulæ Plautinæ</hi>, +in the same way as we still speak of Æsopian fable, and +Homeric verse. <q>Plautus quidem,</q> says Macrobius, <q>ea re +clarus fuit, ut post mortem ejus, comœdiæ, quæ incertæ ferebantur, + Plautinæ tamen esse, de jocorum copia, agnoscerentur<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satur.</hi> Lib. II. c. 1.</note>.</q> +It is thus evident, that a sufficient number of jests +stamped a dramatic piece as the production of Plautus in the +<pb n="161"/><anchor id="Pg161"/>opinion of the multitude. But Gellius farther mentions, that +there was a certain writer of comedies, whose name was +Plautius, and whose plays having the inscription <q>Plauti,</q> +were considered as by Plautus, and were named Plautinæ +from Plautus, though in fact they ought to have been called +Plautianæ from Plautius. All this sufficiently accounts for +the vast number of plays ascribed to Plautus, and which the +most learned and intelligent critics have greatly restricted. +They have differed, however, very widely, as to the number +which they have admitted to be genuine. Some, says Servius, +maintain, that Plautus wrote twenty-one comedies, others + forty, others a hundred<note place="foot">Nam Plautum alii dicunt scripsisse Fabulas XXI. alii XL. alii C. Serv. <hi rend="italic">Ad + Virg. Æneid.</hi> Init.</note>. Gellius informs us, that Lucius +Ælius, a most learned man, was of opinion that not more than + twenty-five were of his composition<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. III. c. 3.</note>. Varro wrote a work, +entitled <hi rend="italic">Quæstiones Plautinæ</hi>, a considerable portion of which +was devoted to a discussion concerning the authenticity of the +plays commonly assigned to Plautus, and the result of his investigation +was, that twenty-one were unquestionably to be +admitted as genuine. These were subsequently termed Varronian, +in consequence of having been separated by Varro +from the remainder, as no way doubtful, and universally +allowed to be by Plautus. The twenty-one Varronian plays +are the twenty still extant, and the <hi rend="italic">Vidularia</hi>. This comedy +appears to have been originally subjoined to the Palatine +MS. of the still existing plays of Plautus, but to have been +torn off, since, at the conclusion of the <hi rend="italic">Truculentus</hi>, we + find the words <q>Vidularia incipit<note place="foot">Fabricius, <hi rend="italic">Bib. Latina</hi>, Lib. I. c. 1. Osannus, <hi rend="italic">Analecta Critica</hi>, c. 8.</note>:</q> And Mai has recently +published some fragments of it, which he found in an Ambrosian +MS. Such, it would appear, had been the high authority +of Varro, that only those plays, which had received his +indubitable sanction, were transcribed in the MSS. as the +genuine works of Plautus; yet it would seem that Varro himself +had, on some occasion, assented to the authenticity of +several others, induced by their style of humour corresponding +to that of Plautus. He had somewhere mentioned, that +the <hi rend="italic">Saturio</hi> (the Glutton,) and the <hi rend="italic">Addictus</hi>, (the Adjudged,) +were written by Plautus during the period in which he laboured +as a slave at the hand-mill. He was also of opinion, that +the <hi rend="italic">Bœotia</hi> was by Plautus; and Aulus Gellius concurs with + him in this<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. III. c. 3.</note>, citing certain verses delivered by a hungry parasite, +which, he says, are perfectly Plautinian, and must satisfy +<pb n="162"/><anchor id="Pg162"/>every person to whom Plautus is familiar, of the authenticity +of that drama. From this very passage, Osannus derives an +argument unfavourable to the authenticity of the play. The +parasite exclaims against the person who first distinguished +hours, and set up the sun-dials, of which the town was so +full. Now, Osannus maintains, that there were no sun-dials +at Rome in the time of Plautus, and that the day was not then + distributed into hours, but into much larger portions of time<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Analect. Critic.</hi> c. 8.</note>. +The <hi rend="italic">Nervolaria</hi> was one of the disputed plays in the time of +Au. Gellius; and also the <hi rend="italic">Fretum</hi>, which Gellius thinks the + most genuine of all<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. III. c. 2.</note>. Varro, in the first Book of his <hi rend="italic">Quæstiones +Plautinæ</hi> gives the following words of Attius, which, +I presume, are quoted from his work on poetry and poets, +entitled <hi rend="italic">Didascalica</hi>. <q>For neither were the <hi rend="italic">Gemini</hi>, the +<hi rend="italic">Leones</hi>, the <hi rend="italic">Condalium</hi>, the <hi rend="italic">Anus Plauti</hi>, the <hi rend="italic">Bis Compressa</hi>, +the <hi rend="italic">Bœotia</hi>, or the <hi rend="italic">Commorientes</hi>, by Plautus, but by M. +Aquilius.</q> It appears, however, from the prologue to the +<hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> of Terence, that the <hi rend="italic">Commorientes</hi> was written by +Plautus, having been taken by him from a Greek comedy of + Diphilus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Sunapothneskontes</hi> Diphili Comœdia ’st: + Eam Commorientes Plautus fecit Fabulam.</note>. In opposition to the above passage of Attius, and +to his own opinion expressed in the <hi rend="italic">Quæstiones Plautinæ</hi>, +Varro, in his treatise on the Latin Language, frequently cites, +as the works of Plautus, the plays enumerated by Attius, and +various others; but this was probably in deference to common +opinion, or in agreement with ordinary language, and +was not intended to contradict what he had elsewhere delivered, +or to stamp with the character of authenticity productions, + which he had more deliberately pronounced to be spurious<note place="foot">We have the opinions of Varro concerning the plays of Plautus only at second + hand. The work in which they are delivered, is lost; but they are minutely + reported in his <hi rend="italic">Attic Nights</hi>, by Aulus Gellius.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +From the review which has now been given of the comedies +of Plautus, something may have been gathered of their general +scope and tenor. In each plot there is sufficient action, movement, +and spirit. The incidents never flag, but rapidly +accelerate the catastrophe. Yet, if we regard his plays in +the mass, there is a considerable, and perhaps too great, +uniformity in their fables. They hinge, for the most part, on +the love of some dissolute youth for a courtezan, his employment +of a slave to defraud a father of a sum sufficient to +supply his expensive pleasures, and the final discovery that +his mistress is a free-born citizen. The charge against +<pb n="163"/><anchor id="Pg163"/>Plautus of uniformity in his characters, as well as in his fables, +has been echoed without much consideration. The portraits +of Plautus, it must be remembered, were drawn or copied at +a time when the division of labour and progress of refinement +had not yet given existence to those various descriptions of +professions and artists—the doctor, author, attorney—in short, +all those characters, whose habits, singularities, and whims, +have supplied the modern Thalia with such diversified materials, +and whose contrasts give to each other such relief, that +no caricature is required in any individual representation. +The characters of Alcmena, Euclio, and Periplectomenes, are +sufficiently novel, and are not repeated in any of the other +dramas; but there is ample range and variety even in those +which he has most frequently employed—the avaricious old +man—the debauched young fellow—the knavish slave—the +braggart captain—the rapacious courtezan—the obsequious +parasite—and the shameless pander. On most of these parts +some observations have been made, while mentioning the +different comedies in which they are introduced. The severe +father and thoughtless youth, are those in which he has best +succeeded, or at least they are those with which we are best +pleased. The captain always appears to us exaggerated, and +the change which has taken place in society and manners +prevents us, perhaps, from entering fully into the characters +of the slave, the parasite, and pander; but in the fathers and +sons, he has shown his knowledge of our common nature, and +delineated them with the truest and liveliest touches. In the +former, the struggles of avarice and severity, with paternal +affection, are finely wrought up and blended. Even when +otherwise respectable characters, they are always represented +as disliking their wives, which was not inconsistent with the +manners of a Grecian state, in which marriage was merely +regarded as a duty; and was a feature naturally enough exhibited +on the theatre of a nation, one of whose most illustrious +characters declared in the Senate, as a received maxim, +that Romans married, not for the sake of domestic happiness, +but to rear up soldiers for the republic. +</p> + +<p> +The Latin style of Plautus excels in briskness of dialogue, +as well as purity of expression, and has been highly extolled +by the learned Roman grammarians, particularly by Varro, +who declares, that if the Muses were to speak Latin they + would employ his diction<note place="foot">Ap. Quintilian, <hi rend="italic">Inst. Orat.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1.</note>; but as M. Schlegel has remarked, +it is necessary to distinguish between the opinion of philologers, +and that of critics and poets. Plautus wrote at a period when +<pb n="164"/><anchor id="Pg164"/>his country as yet possessed no written or literary language. +Every phrase was drawn from the living source of conversation. +This early simplicity seemed pleasing and artless to those Romans, +who lived in an age of excessive refinement and cultivation; +but this apparent merit was rather accidental than the +effect of poetic art. Making, however, some allowance for +this, there can be no doubt that Plautus wonderfully improved +and refined the Latin language from the rude form in which it +had been moulded by Ennius. That he should have effected +such an alteration is not a little remarkable. Plautus was +nearly contemporary with the Father of Roman song—according +to most accounts he was born a slave—he was condemned, +during part of his life, to the drudgery of the lowest manual +labour—and, so far as we learn, he was not distinguished by +the patronage of the Great, or admitted into Patrician society. +Ennius, on the other hand, if he did not pass his life in affluence, +spent it in the exercise of an honourable profession, and +was the chosen familiar friend of Cato, Scipio Africanus, Fulvius +Nobilior, and Lælius, the most learned as well as polished +citizens of the Roman republic, whose conversation in their +unrestrained intercourse must have bestowed on him advantages +which Plautus never enjoyed. But perhaps the circumstance +of his Greek original, which contributed so much to his +learning and refinement, and qualified him for such exalted +society, may have been unfavourable to that native purity of +Latin diction, which the Umbrian slave imbibed from the unmixed +fountains of conversation and nature. +</p> + +<p> +The chief excellence of Plautus is generally reputed to +consist in the wit and comic force of his dialogue; and, accordingly, +the lines in Horace’s <hi rend="italic">Art of Poetry</hi>, in which he +derides the ancient Romans for having foolishly admired the +<q><hi rend="italic">Plautinos sales</hi>,</q> has been the subject of much reprehension + among critics<note place="foot"><q>Immo illi proavi,</q> says Camerarius, (<hi rend="italic">Dissert. de Comœd. Plauti</hi>,) <q>meritò, et + recte, ac sapienter Plautum laudarunt et admirati fuerunt: tuque ad Græcitatem, + omnia, quasi regulam, poemata gentis tuæ exigens, immerito, et perperam, atque + incogitanter culpas.</q>—(See also J. C. Scaliger and Lipsius, <hi rend="italic">Antiq. Lect.</hi> Lib. II. + c. 1.; Turnebus, <hi rend="italic">Advers.</hi> <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">xxv.</hi> 16.; Flor. Sabinus, <hi rend="italic">Adversus Calumniatores Plauti</hi>, + Basil, 1540.) Dan. Heinsius attempted to defend the sentiment of Horace, in his + <hi rend="italic">Dissertatio ad Horatii de Plauto et Terentio judicium</hi>, printed at Amsterdam, + 1618, with his edition of <hi rend="italic">Terence</hi>; and was answered by Benedict Fioretti, in his + <hi rend="italic">Apologia pro Plauto, opposita sævo judicio Horatiano et Heinsiano</hi>.—See, finally, + D. J. Tr. Danz, <hi rend="italic">De Virtute Comica Plauti</hi>, in <hi rend="italic">Dissert. Philolog.</hi> Jenæ, 1800.</note>. That the wit of Plautus often degenerates +into buffoonery, scurrility, and quibbles,—sometimes +even into obscenity,—and that, in his constant attempts at +merriment, he too often tries to excite laughter by exaggerated +expressions, as well as by extravagant actions, cannot, in<pb n="165"/><anchor id="Pg165"/>deed, be denied. This, I think, was partly owing to the immensity +of the Roman theatres, and to the masks and trumpets +of the actors, which must have rendered caricature and grotesque +inventions essential to the production of that due effect, +which, with such scenic apparatus, could not be created, unless +by overstepping the modesty of nature. It must be always be +recollected, that the plays of Plautus were written solely to be +represented, and not to be read. Even in modern times, and +subsequently to the invention of printing, the greatest dramatists—Shakspeare, +for example—cared little about the publication +of their plays; and in every age or country, in which +dramatic poetry has flourished, it has been intended for public +representation, and has been adapted to the taste of a promiscuous +audience. It is the most social of all sorts of composition; +and he who aims at popularity or success in it, must +leave the solitudes of inspiration for the bustle of the world. +</p> + +<p> +The contemplative poet may find his delight, and his reward, +in the mere effort of imagination, but the poet of the +drama must seek them in the applause of the multitude. He +must stoop to men—be the mover of human hearts—and triumph +by the living and hourly passions of our nature. Now, +in the days of Plautus, the smiles of the polite critic were not +enough for a Latin comedian, because in those days there +were few polite critics at Rome; he required the shouts and +laughter of the multitude, who could be fully gratified only +by the broadest grins of comedy. Accordingly, many of the +jests of Plautus are such as might be expected from a writer +anxious to accommodate himself to the taste of the times, and +naturally catching the spirit of ribaldry which prevailed. +</p> + +<p> +During the age of Plautus, and indeed long after it, the general +character of Roman wit consisted rather in a rude and +not very liberal satire, than a just and temperate ridicule, restrained +within the bounds of decency and good manners. A +favourite topic, for example, of ancient raillery, was corporal +defects;—a decisive proof of coarseness of humour, especially +as it was recommended by rule, and enforced by the authority +of the greatest masters, as one of the most legitimate sources +of ridicule.—<q>Est deformitatis et corporis vitiorum satis bella + materies ad jocandum,</q> says Cicero, in his treatise <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi><note place="foot">Lib. II. c. 58.</note>. +The innumerable jests there recorded as having produced +the happiest effects at the bar, are the most miserable +puns and quibbles, coarse practical jokes, or personal reflections. +The cause of this defect in elegance of wit and raillery, +has been attributed by Hurd to the free and popular constitution +of Rome. This, by placing all its citizens, at least +<pb n="166"/><anchor id="Pg166"/>during certain periods, on a level, and diffusing a general +spirit of independence, took off those restraints of civility +which are imposed by the dread of displeasing, and which +can alone curb the licentiousness of ridicule. The only court +to be paid was from the orators to the people, in the continual +and immediate applications to them which were rendered +necessary by the form of government. On such occasions, the +popular assemblies had to be entertained with those gross banters, +which were likely to prove most acceptable to them. +Design growing into habit, the orators, and after them the nation, +accustomed themselves to coarse ridicule at all times, till +the humour passed from the rostrum, or forum, to the theatre, +where the amusement and laughter of the people being the +direct and immediate aim, it was heightened to still farther +extravagance. This taste, says Hurd, was also fostered and +promoted at Rome by the festal license which prevailed in the + seasons of the Bacchanalia and Saturnalia<note place="foot">Hurd’s <hi rend="italic">Horace</hi>. Gibbon’s <hi rend="italic">Miscellaneous Works</hi>, Vol. IV.</note>. Quintilian +thinks, that, with some regulation, those days of periodical license +might have aided the cultivation of a correct spirit of +raillery; but, as it was, they tended to vitiate and corrupt it. +The Roman muse, too, had been nurtured amid satiric and +rustic exhibitions, the remembrance of which was still cherished, +and a recollection of them kept alive, by the popular +<hi rend="italic">Exodia</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Fabulæ Atellanæ</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +Such being the taste of the audience whom he had to please, +and who crowded to the theatre not to acquire purity of taste, +but to relax their minds with merriment and jest, it became +the great object of Plautus to make his audience laugh; and +for this he sacrificed every other consideration. <q>Nec quicquam,</q> +says Scaliger, <q>veritus est, modo auditorem excitaret +risu.</q> With this view, he must have felt that he was more +likely to succeed by emulating the broader mirth of the old +or middle comedy, than by the delicate railleries and exquisite +painting of Menander. Accordingly, though he generally +borrowed his plots from the writers of the new comedy, +his wit and humour have more the relish of the old, and they +have been classed by Cicero as of the same description with + the drollery which enlivened its scenes<note place="foot"><q>Duplex omnino est jocandi genus; unum illiberale, petulans, obscœnum, alterum + elegans, urbanum, ingeniosum, facetum; quo genere non modo Plautus noster, + et Atticorum antiqua comœdia, sed etiam Philosophorum Socraticorum libri sunt + referti.</q>—<hi rend="italic">De Officiis</hi>, Lib. I. c. 29.</note>. The audience, for +whom the plays of Plautus were written, could understand or +enjoy only a representation of the manners and witticisms to +which they were accustomed. To the fastidious critics of the +<pb n="167"/><anchor id="Pg167"/>court of Augustus, an admirer of Plautus might have replied +in the words of Antiphanes, a Greek dramatist of the middle +comedy, who being commanded to read one of his plays to +Alexander the Great, and finding that the production was not +relished by the royal critic, thus addressed him: <q>I cannot +wonder that you disapprove of my comedy, for he who could +be entertained by it must have been present at the scenes it +represents. <hi rend="italic">He must be acquainted with the public humours +of our vulgar ordinaries</hi>—have been familiar with the impure +manners of our courtezans—a party in the breaking up of +many a brothel—and a sufferer, as well as actor, in those unseemly +riots. Of all these things you are not informed; and +the fault lies more in my presumption in intruding them on +your hearing, than in any want of fidelity with which I have + portrayed them<note place="foot">Athenæus, Lib. XIII. c. 1.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Indeed, this practice of consulting the tastes of the people, +if it be a fault, is one which is common to all comic writers. +Aristophanes, who was gifted with far higher powers than +Plautus, and who was no less an elegant poet than a keen satirist, +as is evinced by the lyric parts of his <hi rend="italic">Frogs</hi>, often prostituted +his talents to the lowest gratifications of the multitude. +Shakspeare regarded the drama as entirely a thing for the +people, and treated it as such throughout. He took the popular +comedy as he found it; and whatever enlargements or +improvements he introduced on the stage, were still calculated +and contrived according to the spirit of his predecessors, and +the taste of a London audience. When, in Charles’s days, a +ribald taste became universal in England, <q>unhappy Dryden</q> +bowed down his genius to the times. Even in the refined age +of Louis XIV., it was said of the first comic genius of his +country, that he would have attained the perfection of his art, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none"><hi rend="italic">Si moins ami du peuple</hi> en ses doctes peintures,</q></l> +<l>Il n’eût point fait souvent grimacer ses figures,</l> +<l>Quitte, pour le bouffon, l’agreable et le fin,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Et, sans honte, a Terence allié Tabarin.</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left:16"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Boileau.</hi></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Lopez de Vega, in his <hi rend="italic">Arte de hacer Comedias</hi>, written, in +1609, at the request of a poetical academy, and containing a +code of laws for the modern drama, admits, that when he was +about to write a comedy, he laid aside all dramatic precepts, +and wrote solely for the vulgar, who had to pay for their +amusement: +</p> + +<pb n="168"/><anchor id="Pg168"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quando he de escribir una comedia,</q></l> +<l>Encierro los preceptos con seis llaves;</l> +<l>Saco a Terencio y Plauto de mi studio</l> +<l>Para que no den voces, porque suele</l> +<l>Dar gritos la verdad en libios mudos;</l> +<l>Y escribo por el arte que inventaron</l> +<l>Los que el vulgar aplauso pretendieron,</l> +<l>Porque como los paga el vulgo, es justo</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Hablarle in necio para darle gusto.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +His indulgent conformity, however, to the unpolished taste +of his age, ought not to be admitted as an excuse for the obscenities +which Plautus has introduced. But though it must +be confessed, that he is liable to some censure in this particular, +he is not nearly so culpable as has been generally imagined. +The commentators, indeed, have been often remarkably +industrious in finding out allusions, which do not consist very +clearly with the plain and obvious meaning of the context. +The editor of the Delphin Plautus has not rejected above five +pages from the twenty plays on this account; and many passages +even in those could hardly offend the most scrupulous +reader. Some of the comedies, indeed, as the <hi rend="italic">Captivi</hi> and +<hi rend="italic">Trinummus</hi>, are free from any moral objection; and, with the +exception of the <hi rend="italic">Casina</hi>, none of them are so indelicate as many +plays of Massinger and Ford, in the time of James I., or Etheridge +and Shadwell, during the reigns of Charles II. and his +successor. +</p> + +<p> +It being the great aim of Plautus to excite the merriment of +the rabble, he, of course, was little anxious about the strict +preservation of the dramatic unities; and it was a more important +object with him to bring a striking scene into view, than +to preserve the unity of place. In the <hi rend="italic">Aulularia</hi>, part of the +action is laid in the miser’s dwelling, and part in the various +places where he goes to conceal his treasure: in the <hi rend="italic">Mostellaria</hi> +and <hi rend="italic">Truculentus</hi>, the scene changes from the street to +apartments in different houses. +</p> + +<p> +But, notwithstanding these and other irregularities, Plautus +so enchanted the people by the drollery of his wit, and the +buffoonery of his scenes, that he continued the reigning favourite +of the stage long after the more correct plays of Cæcilius, +Afranius, and even Terence, were first represented. +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Cæcilius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Caecilius"/> +<head>CÆCILIUS,</head> + +<p> +who was originally a slave, acquired this name with his freedom, +having been at first called by the servile appellation of +<pb n="169"/><anchor id="Pg169"/>Statius<note place="foot">Au. Gellius, <hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. IV. c. 20.</note>. He was a native of Milan, and flourished towards +the end of the sixth century of Rome, having survived Ennius, +whose intimate friend he was, about one year, which places +his death in 586. We learn from the prologue to the <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi> +of Terence, spoken in the person of Ambivius, the principal +actor, or rather manager of the theatre, that, when he first +brought out the plays of Cæcilius, some were hissed off the +stage, and others hardly stood their ground; but knowing the +fluctuating fortunes of dramatic exhibitions, he had again +attempted to bring them forward. His perseverance having +obtained for them a full and unprejudiced hearing, they failed +not to please; and this success excited the author to new +efforts in the poetic art, which he had nearly abandoned in a +fit of despondency. The comedies of Cæcilius, which amounted +to thirty, are all lost, so that our opinion of their merits can +be formed only from the criticisms of those Latin authors who +wrote before they had perished. Cicero blames the improprieties + of his style and language<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 74. Cæcilium et Pacuvium male locutos videmus.</note>. From Horace’s Epistle +to Augustus, we may collect what was the popular sentiment +concerning Cæcilius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Vincere Cæcilius gravitate—Terentius arte.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is not easy to see how a comic author could be more grave +than Terence; and the quality applied to a writer of this cast +appears of rather difficult interpretation. But the opinion +which had been long before given by Varro affords a sort of +commentary on Horace’s expression—<q>In argumentis,</q> says +he, <q>Cæcilius palmam poscit; in ethesi Terentius.</q> By <hi rend="italic">gravitas</hi>, +therefore, as applied to Cæcilius, we may properly +enough understand the grave and affecting plots of his comedies; +which is farther confirmed by what Varro elsewhere +observes of him—<q><hi rend="italic">Pathe</hi> Trabea, Attilius, et Cæcilius facile +moverunt.</q> Velleius Paterculus joins him with Terence and +Afranius, whom he reckons the most excellent comic writers +of Rome—<q>Dulcesque Latini leporis facetiæ per Cæcilium, + Terentiumque, et Afranium, sub pari ætate, + nituerunt<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Histor. Roman.</hi> Lib. I. c. 17.</note><anchor id="corr169"/><corr sic="(quote missing)">.</corr></q> +</p> + +<p> +A great many of the plays of Cæcilius were taken from +Menander; and Aulus Gellius informs us that they seemed +agreeable and pleasing enough, till, being compared with +their Greek models, they appeared quite tame and disgusting, +and the wit of the original, which they were unable to imitate,<pb n="170"/><anchor id="Pg170"/> + totally vanished<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. II. c. 23.</note>. He accordingly contrasts a scene in the +<hi rend="italic">Plocius</hi> (or Necklace,) of Cæcilius, with the corresponding +scene in Menander, and pronounces them to be as different +in brightness and value as the arms of Diomed and Glaucus. +The scenes compared are those where an old husband complains +that his wife, who was rich and ugly, had obliged him +to sell a handsome female slave, of whom she was jealous. +This chapter of Aulus Gellius is very curious, as it gives us a +more perfect notion than we obtain from any other writer, of +the mode in which the Latin comic poets copied the Greeks. +To judge from this single comparison, it appears that though +the Roman dramatists imitated the incidents, and caught the +ideas of their great masters, their productions were not entirely +translations or slavish versions: A different turn is +frequently given to a thought—the sentiments are often differently +expressed, and sometimes much is curtailed, or +altogether omitted. +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Afranius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Afranius"/> +<head>AFRANIUS,</head> + +<p> +though he chose Roman subjects, whence his comedies were +called <hi rend="italic">Togatæ</hi>, was an imitator of the manner of Menander— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Dicitur Afranî toga convenisse Menandro.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Indeed he himself admits, in his <hi rend="italic">Compitales</hi>, that he derived +many even of his plots from Menander and other Greek +writers— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Fateor, sumpsi non a Menandro modo,</q></l> +<l>Sed ut quisque habuit, quod conveniret mihi;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quod me non posse melius facere credidi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> + Cicero<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 45. L. Afranius poeta, homo perargutus; in fabulis quidem etiam, + ut scitis, disertus.</note> calls Afranius an ingenious and eloquent writer. +Ausonius, in one of his epigrams, talks <q><hi rend="italic">facundi Afrani</hi>.</q> +He is also praised by Quintilian, who censures him, however, + for the flagitious amours which he represented on the stage<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Instit. Orat.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1. To this charge Ausonius also alludes, though with + little reprehension, + <lg> + <!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Præter legitimi genitalia fœdera <anchor id="corr170"/><corr sic="coetûs">cœtûs</corr>,</q></l> + <l>Repperit obscænas veneres vitiosa libido;</l> + <l>Herculis heredi quam Lemnia suasit egestas,</l> + <l><q rend="pre: none">Quam toga facundi scenis agitavit Afranî.</q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:14"><hi rend="italic">Epigram.</hi> 71.</l> + </lg> + </note>, +on account of which, perhaps, his writings were condemned to<pb n="171"/><anchor id="Pg171"/> +the flames by Pope Gregory I. The titles of forty-six of his +plays have been collected by Fabricius, and a few fragments +have been edited by Stephens. One of these, in the play +entitled <hi rend="italic">Sella</hi>, where it is said that wisdom is the child of experience +and memory, has been commended by Aulus Gellius, +and is plausibly conjectured<note place="foot">Spence’s <hi rend="italic">Polymetis</hi>.</note> to have been introduced in a +prologue spoken in the person of Wisdom herself— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Usus me genuit, mater peperit Memoria:</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Sophiam vocant me Graii; vos Sapientiam.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +The following lines from the <hi rend="italic">Vopiscum</hi> have also been frequently +quoted: +</p> + +<lg> +<l><q rend="post: none">Si possent homines delinimentis capi,</q></l> +<l>Omnes haberent nunc amatores anus.</l> +<l>Ætas, et corpus tenerum, et morigeratio,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Hæc sunt venena formosarum mulierum<note place="foot"> +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Could men to love be lured by magic rites,</q></l> +<l>Each crone would with a lover sooth her nights:</l> +<l>A tender form, and youth, and gentle smiles,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Are the sweet potion which the heart beguiles.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Luscius Lavinius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Luscius Lavinius"/> +<head>LUSCIUS LAVINIUS,</head> + +<p> +also a follower of Menander, was the contemporary and enemy +of Terence, who, in his prologues, has satirized his injudicious +translations from the Greek— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Qui bene, vertendo et eas describendo male,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ex Græcis bonis, Latinas fecit non bonas<note place="foot">Eunuchus, <hi rend="italic">Prolog.</hi></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In particular, we learn from the prologue to the <hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi>, +that he was fond of bringing on the stage frantic youths, committing +all those excesses of folly and distraction which are +supposed to be produced by violent love. Donatus has +afforded us an account of the plot of his <hi rend="italic">Phasma</hi>, which was +taken from Menander. A lady, who, before marriage, had a +daughter, the fruit of a secret amour with a person now living +in a house adjacent to her husband’s, made an opening in the +wall of her own dwelling, in order to communicate with that +in which her former paramour and daughter resided. That +this entrance might appear a consecrated spot to her husband’s +family, she decked it with garlands, and shaded it with +branches of trees. To this passage she daily repaired as if to +pay her devotions, but in fact, to procure interviews with her +<pb n="172"/><anchor id="Pg172"/>illegitimate daughter. Her husband also had, by a former +wife, a son, who dwelt in his father’s house, and who, having +one day accidentally peeped through the aperture, beheld the +girl; and, as she was possessed of almost supernatural beauty, +he was struck with awe, as at the sight of a Spirit or divinity, +whence the play received the name of <hi rend="italic">Phasma</hi>. The young +man, discovering at length that she is a mortal, conceives for +her a violent passion, and is finally united to her, with the consent +of his father, and to the great satisfaction of the mother. +There is another play of Menander, which has also been +closely imitated by Luscius Lavinius. Plautus, we have seen, +borrowed his <hi rend="italic">Trinummus</hi> from the <hi rend="italic">Thesaurus</hi> of Philemon. +But Menander also wrote a <hi rend="italic">Thesaurus</hi>, which has been copied +by Lavinius. An old man, by his last will, had commanded, +that, ten years after his death, his son should carry libations +to the monument under which he was to be interred. The +youth, having squandered his fortune, sold the ground on +which this monument stood to an old miser. At the end of +ten years, the prodigal sent a servant to the tomb with due +offerings, according to the injunctions of his deceased father. +The servant applied to the new proprietor to assist him in +opening the monument, in which they discovered a hoard of +gold. The miserly owner of the soil seized the treasure, and +retained it on pretence of having deposited it there for safety +during a period of public commotion. It is claimed, however, +by the young man, who goes to law with him; and the plot of +the comedy chiefly consists in the progress of the suit<note place="foot">Donatus, <hi rend="italic">Comment. in Terent. Eunuch. Prolog.</hi></note>—the +dramatic management of which has been ridiculed by Terence, +in the prologue to the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>, since, contrary to the custom +and rules of all courts of justice, the author had introduced +the defendant pleading his title to the treasure before +the plaintiff had explained his pretensions, and entered on the +grounds of his demand. Part of the old Scotch ballad, The +Heir of Linne, has a curious resemblance to the plot of this +play of Luscius Lavinius. +</p> + +<p> +Turpilius, Trabea, and Attilius, were the names of comic +writers who lived towards the end of the sixth and beginning +of the seventh century, from the building of Rome. Of these, +and other contemporary dramatists, it would now be difficult +to say more than that their works have perished, and to repeat +a few scattered incidental criticisms delivered by Varro or +Cicero. To them probably may be attributed the <hi rend="italic">Baccharia</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Cæcus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Cornicularia</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Parasitus</hi>, and innumerable other comedies, +of which the names have been preserved by gramma<pb n="173"/><anchor id="Pg173"/>rians. Of such works, once the favourites of the Roman stage, +few memorials survive, and these only to be found separate +and imperfect in the quotations of scholiasts. Sometimes +from a single play numerous passages have been preserved; +but they are so detached, that they neither give us any insight +into the fable to which they appertain, nor enable us to pronounce +on the excellence of the dramatic characters. In +general, they comprise so small a portion of uninterrupted +dialogue, that we can scarcely form a judgment even of the +style and manner of the poet, or of the beauty of his versification. +All that is now valuable in these fragments is a few brief +moral maxims, and some examples of that <hi rend="italic">vis comica</hi>, which +consists in an ingenious and forcible turn of expression in the +original language. +</p> + +<p> +It is not difficult to account for the vast number of dramatic +productions which we thus see were brought forward at Rome +in the early ages of the Republic. There are two ways in +which literature may be supported,—By the patronage of +distinguished individuals, as it was in the time of Mæcenas +and the age of Lorenzo de Medici; or, By the encouragement +of a great literary public, as it is now rewarded in modern +Europe. But, in Rome, literature as yet had not obtained the +protection of an emperor or a favourite minister; and previous +to the invention of printing, which alone could give extensive +circulation to his productions, a poet could hardly gain a +livelihood by any means, except by supplying popular entertainments +for the stage. These were always liberally paid for +by the Ædiles, or other directors of the public amusements. +To this species of composition, accordingly, the poet directed +his almost undivided attention; and a prodigious facility was +afforded to his exertions by the inexhaustible dramatic stores +which he found prepared for him in Greece. +</p></div><div> +<index index="toc" level1="Trabea"/><index index="pdf" level1="Trabea"/> +<head>TRABEA.</head> + +<p> +The plays of Quintus Trabea, supposed to belong chiefly +to the class called <hi rend="italic">Togatæ</hi>, are frequently cited by the grammarians, +and are mentioned with approbation by Cicero. He +in particular commends the lines where this poet so agreeably +describes the credulity and overweening satisfaction of a +lover— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Tantâ lætitiâ auctus sum ut mihi non constem:</q></l> +<l>Nunc demum mihi animus ardet.</l> +<l>Lena, delinita argento, nutum observabit meum—</l> +<l>Quid velim quid studeam: adveniens digito impellam januam:</l> +<pb n="174"/><anchor id="Pg174"/><l>Fores patebunt—de improviso Chrysis, ubi me aspexit,</l> +<l>Alacris obviam mihi veniet, complexum exoptans meum;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mihi se dedet.—Fortunam ipsam anteibo fortunis meis<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">I swell with such gladness my brain almost turns,</q></l> +<l>And my bosom with thoughts of my happiness burns.</l> +<l>The portress compliant—the way cleared before—</l> +<l>A touch of my finger throws open the door:</l> +<l>Then, Chrysis—fair Chrysis, will rush to my arms,</l> +<l>Will court my caresses, and yield all her charms.</l> +<l>Such transport will seize me when this comes to pass,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">I’ll Fortune herself in good fortune surpass.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The name of Trabea was made use of in a well known deception +practised on Joseph Scaliger by Muretus. Scaliger +piqued himself on his faculty of distinguishing the characteristic +styles of ancient writers. In order to entrap him, Muretus +showed him some verses, pretending that he had received +them from Germany, where they had been transcribed from +an ancient MS. attributed to Q. Trabea— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Here, si querelis, ejulatu, fletibus,</q></l> +<l>Medicina fieret miseriis mortalium,</l> +<l>Auro parandæ lachrymæ contra forent:</l> +<l>Nunc hæc ad minuenda mala non magis valent</l> +<l>Quam Nænia præficæ ad excitandos mortuos:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Res turbidæ consilium, non fletum, expetunt<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">O, could complaints or tears avail</q></l> +<l>To cure those ills which life assail,</l> +<l>Even gold would not be price too dear</l> +<l>At which to win a healing tear.</l> +<l>But, since the tears by sorrow shed</l> +<l>Are vain as dirge to wake the dead,</l> +<l>In prudent care, and not in grief,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">All human ills must find relief.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Scaliger was so completely deceived, that he afterwards cited +these verses, as lines from the play of <hi rend="italic">Harpace</hi>, by Q. Trabea, +in the first edition of his Commentary on Varro’s Dialogues +<hi rend="italic">De Re Rustica</hi>, in order to illustrate some obscure expression +of his author—<q>Quis enim,</q> says he, <q>tam aversus a Musis, +tamque humanitatis expers, qui horum publicatione offendatur.</q> +Muretus, not content with this malicious trick, afterwards +sent him some other verses, to which he affixed the +name of Attius, expressing, but more diffusely, the same idea. +Scaliger, in his next edition of Varro, published them, along +with the former lines, as fragments from the <hi rend="italic">Œnomaus</hi>, a +tragedy by Attius, and a plagiarism from Trabea—observing, +at the end of his note, <q>Fortasse de hoc nimis.</q> Muretus +said nothing for two years; but, at the end of that period, he +published a volume of his own Latin poems, and, along with +them, under the title <hi rend="italic">Afficta Trabeæ</hi>, both sets of verses which +<pb n="175"/><anchor id="Pg175"/>he had thus palmed on Scaliger for undoubted remnants of +antiquity. The whole history of the imposture was fully +disclosed in a note: Both poems, it was acknowledged, were +versions of a fragment, attributed by some to Menander, and +by others to Philemon, beginning,—<foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ει τα δακρυα ἡμιν, κ.τ.λ.</foreign><!--[Greek: Ei ta dakrya hêmin, k.t.l.]--> +They have been also translated into Latin by Naugerius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Carmina</hi>, 45. Ed. 1718.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The progress of time, the ravages of war, and the intervention +of a period of barbarism, which have deprived us of so +many dramatic works of the Romans, have fortunately spared +six plays of +</p> +</div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Terence"/><index index="pdf" level1="Terence"/> +<head>TERENCE,</head> + +<p> +which are perhaps the most valuable remains that have descended +to us among the works of antiquity. This celebrated +dramatist, the delight and ornament of the Roman stage, was +born at Carthage, about the 560th year of Rome. In what +manner he came or was brought thither is uncertain. He +was, in early youth, the freedman of one Terentius Lucanus +in that city, whose name has been perpetuated only by the +glory of his slave. After he had obtained his freedom, he +became the friend of Lælius, and of the younger Scipio Africanus<note place="foot">Donatus, <hi rend="italic">Vit. Terent.</hi></note>. +His <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> was not acted till the year 587—two +years, according to the Eusebian Chronicle, after the death of +Cæcilius; which unfortunately throws some doubt on the +agreeable anecdote recorded by Donatus, of his introduction, +in a wretched garb, into the house of Cæcilius, in order to +read his comedy to that poet, by whom, as a mean person, he +was seated on a low stool, till he astonished him with the +matchless grace and elegance of the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>, when he was +placed on the couch, and invited to partake the supper of the +veteran dramatist. Several writers have conjectured, it might +be to another than to Cæcilius that Terence read his comedy<note place="foot">Tiraboschi, <hi rend="italic">Storr. Dell. Lett. Ital.</hi> Part III. Lib. II. c. 1. Arnaud, <hi rend="italic">Gazette +Litteraire</hi>, 1765.</note>; +or, as the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> is not indisputably his first comedy, that it +might be one of the others which he read to Cæcilius<note place="foot">Goujet, <hi rend="italic">Bib. Franc.</hi> Tom. IV. Sulzer relates this story of Terence and the +ædile Cerius, to whose review the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> had been subjected.—<hi rend="italic">Theorie der Schönen +Künste</hi>, Tom. IV. <hi rend="italic">Terenz</hi>.</note>. Supposing +the Eusebian Chronicle to be accurate in the date +which it fixes for the death of Cæcilius, it is just possible, +that Terence may have written and read to him his <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> two +<pb n="176"/><anchor id="Pg176"/>years previous to its representation. After he had given six +comedies to the stage, Terence left Rome for Greece, whence +he never returned. The manner of his death, however, is +altogether uncertain. According to one report, he perished +at sea, while on his voyage from Greece to Italy, bringing +with him an hundred and eight comedies, which he had translated +from Menander: according to other accounts, he died in +Arcadia for grief at the loss of those comedies, which he had +sent before him by sea to Rome. In whatever way it was +occasioned, his death happened when he was at the early age +of thirty-four, and in the year 594 from the building of the +city. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>,—acted in 587, is the first in point of time, and is +usually accounted the first in merit, of the productions of +Terence. Like most of his other comedies, it has a double +plot. It is compounded of the <hi rend="italic">Andrian</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Perinthian</hi> of +Menander; but it does not appear, that Terence took his +principal plot from one of those Greek plays, and the under-plot +from the other. He employed both to form his chief +fable; and added the characters, on which the under plot is +founded, from his own invention, or from some third play now +unknown to us. +</p> + +<p> +At the commencement of the play, Simo, the father of +Pamphilus, informs Sosia of his son’s love for Glycerium. In +consequence of a report of this attachment spreading abroad, +Chremes refuses his daughter, who had previously been promised +to Pamphilus in marriage: Simo, however, still pretends +to make preparations for the nuptials, in order more +accurately to ascertain the state of his son’s affections. Charinus, +the lover of Chremes’ daughter, is in despair at the +prospect of this union; but he is comforted by the assurances +of Pamphilus, that he would do every thing in his power to +retard it. By this time, Davus, the slave of Pamphilus, discovers, +that it is not intended his master’s marriage should in +reality proceed; and, perceiving it is a pretext, he advises +Pamphilus to declare that he is ready to obey his father’s +commands. Glycerium, meanwhile, gives birth to a child; +but Simo believes, that her reported delivery was a stratagem +of Davus, to deter Chremes from acceding to his daughter’s +marriage with Pamphilus. Simo, however, at length prevails +on him to give his consent. Pamphilus is thus placed in a +most perplexing dilemma with all parties. His mistress, Glycerium, +and her attendants, believe him to be false; while +Charinus thinks that he had deceived him; and, as he had +given his consent to the marriage, he can form no excuse to +his father or Chremes for not concluding it. Hence his rage +<pb n="177"/><anchor id="Pg177"/>against Davus, and new stratagems on the part of the slave +to prevent the nuptials. He contrives that Chremes should +overhear a conversation between him and Mysis, Glycerium’s +attendant, concerning the child which her mistress bore to +Pamphilus, and Chremes in consequence instantly breaks off +from his engagement. In this situation, Crito arrives to claim +heirship to Chrysis, the reputed sister of Glycerium. He +discloses, that Glycerium having been shipwrecked in infancy, +had been preserved by his kinsman, the father of Chrysis; +and, from his detail, it is discovered, that she is the daughter +of Chremes. There is thus no farther obstacle to her marriage +with Pamphilus; and the other daughter of Chremes is +of course united to Charinus. +</p> + +<p> +The long narrative with which the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>, like several +other plays of Terence, commences, and which is a component +part of the drama itself, is beautiful in point of style, +and does not fail to excite our interest concerning the characters. +We perceive the compassion and even admiration +of Simo for Glycerium, and we feel that, if convinced of her +respectable birth and character, he would have preferred her +to all others, even to the daughter of Chremes. Glycerium, +indeed, does not appear on the stage; but her actual appearance +could scarcely have added to the interest which her +hapless situation inspires. Simo is the model of an excellent +father. He is not so easily duped by his slaves as most of +the old men in Plautus; and his temper does not degenerate, +like that of many other characters in the plays of Terence, +either into excessive harshness, or criminal indulgence. His +observations are strikingly just, and are the natural language +of age and experience. Chremes, the other old man, does +not divide our interest with Simo; yet we see just enough of +his good disposition, to make us sympathize with his happiness +in the discovery of a daughter. Pamphilus is rendered interesting +by his tenderness for Glycerium, and respect for his +father. Davus supports the character of a shrewd, cunning, +penetrating slave; he is wholly devoted to the interests of +Pamphilus, but is often comically deterred from executing +his stratagems by dread of the lash of his old master. The +part of Crito, too, is happily imagined: His apprehension +lest he be suspected of seeking an inheritance to which he +has no just title, and his awkward feelings on coming to claim +the wealth of a kinswoman of suspicious character, are artfully +unfolded. Even the gossip and absurd flattery of the +midwife, Lesbia, is excellent. The poet has also shewn considerable +address in portraying the character of Chrysis, who +was supposed to be the sister of Glycerium, but had died +<pb n="178"/><anchor id="Pg178"/>previous to the commencement of the action. In the first +scene, he represents her as having for a long while virtuously +struggled with adverse fortune, and having finally been precipitated +into vice rather by pressure of poverty than depravity +of will; and afterwards, in the pathetic account which +Pamphilus gives of his last conference with her, we insensibly +receive a pleasing impression of her character, and forget her +errors for the sake of her amiable qualities. All this was +necessary, in order to prevent our forming a disadvantageous +idea of Glycerium, who had resided with Chrysis, but was +afterwards to become the wife of Pamphilus, and to be acknowledged +as the daughter of Chremes. +</p> + +<p> +This play has been imitated in the <hi rend="italic">Andrienne</hi> of Baron, +the celebrated French actor. The Latin names are preserved +in the <hi rend="italic">dramatis personæ</hi>, and the first, second, and fifth acts, +have been nearly translated from Terence. In the fourth, +however, instead of the marriage being interrupted by Davus’s +stratagem, Glycerium, hearing a report of the falsehood of +her lover, rushes on the stage, throws herself at the feet of +Chremes, and prevails on him to break off the intended +match between his daughter and Pamphilus. But, though +the incidents are nearly the same, the dialogue is ill written, +and is very remote from the graceful ease and simplicity of +Terence. +</p> + +<p> +Steele’s <hi rend="italic">Conscious Lovers</hi> is the best imitation of the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>. +The English play, it will be remembered, commences +in a similar manner with the Latin comedy, by Sir John +Bevil relating to an old servant, that he had discovered the +love of his son for Indiana, an unknown and stranger girl, +by his behaviour at a masquerade. The report of this attachment +nearly breaks off an intended marriage between young +Bevil and Lucinda, Sealand’s daughter. Young Bevil relieves +the mind of Myrtle, the lover of Lucinda, by assuring +him that he is utterly averse to the match. Still, however, +he pretends to his father, that he is ready to comply with his +wishes; and, meanwhile, writes to Lucinda, requesting that +she would refuse the offer of his hand. Myrtle, hearing of +this correspondence having taken place, without knowing its +import, is so fired with jealousy that he sends Bevil a challenge. +Sealand, being still pressed by Sir John to bestow +his daughter in marriage, waits on Indiana, in order to discover +the precise nature of her relations with Bevil. She details +to him her story; and, on his alluding to the probability of +the projected nuptials being soon concluded, she tears off, in +a transport of passion, a bracelet, by which Sealand discovers, +that she is a daughter whom he had lost, and who, while +<pb n="179"/><anchor id="Pg179"/>proceeding to join him in the East Indies, had been carried +into a French harbour, where she first met with young Bevil. +</p> + +<p> +An English translator of Terence remarks, <q>That Steele has +unfolded his plot with more art than his predecessor, but is +greatly his inferior in delineation of character. Simo is the +most finished character in the Latin piece, but Sir John Bevil, +who corresponds to him, is quite insignificant. Young Bevil +is the most laboured character in the <hi rend="italic">Conscious Lovers</hi>, but he +is inferior to Pamphilus. His deceit is better managed by Terence +than Steele. Bevil’s supposed consent to marry is followed +by no consequence; and his honest dissimulation, as he +calls it, is less reconcilable to the philosophic turn of his +character, than to the natural sensibility of Pamphilus. Besides, +the conduct of the latter is palliated, by being driven +to it by the artful instigations of Davus, who executes the +lower part of the stratagems, whereas Bevil is left entirely to +his own resources.</q> Bevil, indeed, in spite of his refinement +and formality, his admiration of the moral writers, and, <q>the +charming vision of Mirza consulted in a morning,</q> is a good +deal of a <hi rend="italic">Plato-Scapin</hi>. Indiana, who corresponds to Glycerium, +is introduced with more effect than the ladies in the +French plays imitated from Terence. Her tearing off her +ornaments, however, in a fit of despair, at the conclusion, is +too violent. It is inconsistent with the rest of her character; +and we feel that she would not have done so, had not the author +found that the bracelet was necessary for her recognition +as the daughter of Sealand. The under plot is perhaps better +managed in the English than in the Latin play. Myrtle +sustains a part more essential to the principal fable than Charinus; +and his character is better discriminated from that of +Bevil than those of the two lovers in the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>. The part +of Cimberton, the other lover of Lucinda, favoured by Mrs +Sealand, is of Steele’s own contrivance; and of course, also, +the stratagem devised by Bevil, in which Myrtle and Tom +pretend to be lawyers, and Myrtle afterwards personates Sir +Geoffry Cimberton, the uncle of his rival. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> has also suggested those scenes of Moore’s +<hi rend="italic">Foundling</hi>, which relate to the love of young Belmont, and +the recognition of Fidelia as the daughter of Sir Charles Raymond. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>.—Though, in modern times, the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> has +been the most admired play of Terence, in Rome the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> +was by much the most popular of all his performances, +and he received for it 8000 sesterces, the greatest reward +which poet had ever yet obtained<note place="foot">Donatus, <hi rend="italic">Vit. Terent.</hi></note>. In the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>, indeed, +<pb n="180"/><anchor id="Pg180"/>there is much grace and delicacy, and some tenderness; but +the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> is so full of vivacity and fire, as almost to redeem +its author from the well-known censure of Cæsar, that +there was no <hi rend="italic">vis comica</hi> in his dramas. +</p> + +<p> +The chief part of the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> is taken from a play of the +same title by Menander; but the characters of the parasite +and captain have been transferred into it from another play of +Menander, called <hi rend="italic">Kolax</hi>. There was an old play, too, by +Nævius, founded on the <hi rend="italic">Kolax</hi>; but Terence, in his prologue, +denies having been indebted to this performance. +</p> + +<p> +The scenes of the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> are so arranged, that the +main plot is introduced by that which is secondary, and which +at first has the appearance of being the principal one. Phædria +is brought on the stage venting his indignation at being +excluded from the house of the courtezan Thais, for the sake +of Thraso, who is the sole braggart captain exhibited in the +plays of our author. Thais, however, succeeds in persuading +Phædria that she would admit Thraso only for two days, in +order to obtain from him the gift of a damsel who had originally +belonged to the mother of Thais, but after her death +had been sold to the captain. Phædria, vying in gifts with +Thraso, presents his mistress with an Ethiopian eunuch. The +younger brother of Phædria, who is called Chærea, having +accidentally seen the maid presented to Thais by Thraso, falls +in love with her, and, by a stratagem of his father’s slave Parmeno, +he is introduced as the <anchor id="corr180"/><corr sic="enuuch">eunuch</corr> to the house of Thais, +where he does not in all respects consistently support the character +he had assumed. After Chærea had gone off, his adventure +was discovered; and Pythias, the waiting maid of Thais, in +revenge for Parmeno’s fraud, tells him that Chærea, having +been detected, was about to be made precisely what he had +pretended to be. Parmeno, believing this report, informs +the father of Chærea, who instantly rushes into the house of +Thais, (to which, by this time, his son had ventured to return,) +and being there relieved from his sudden apprehension, he +consents the more readily to the marriage of Chærea with the +girl whom he had deluded, and who is now discovered to be +an Athenian citizen, and the sister of Chremes. In this paroxysm +of good humour, he also agrees that Phædria should +retain Thais as his mistress. Thraso and his parasite, Gnatho, +having been foiled in an attack on the house of Thais, enter +into terms, and, at the persuasion of Gnatho, Thraso is admitted +into the society of Phædria, and is allowed to share with him +the favours of Thais. +</p> + +<p> +There are thus, strictly speaking, three plots in the <hi rend="italic">Eunu<pb n="181"/><anchor id="Pg181"/>chus</hi>, but they are blended with inimitable art. The quarrel +and reconciliation of Thais and Phædria promote the marriage +of Chærea with Pamphila, the girl presented by Thraso +to Thais. This gift again produces the dispute between +Phædria and Thais, and gives room for the imposture of +Chærea. It is unfortunate that the regard in which the ancient +dramatists held the unity of place, interposed between the +spectators and the representation of what would have been +highly comical—the father discovering his son in the eunuch’s +habit in the house of Thais, the account of which has been +thrown into narrative. At the conclusion Thraso is permitted, +with consent of Phædria, to share the good graces of Thais; +but, as has been remarked by La Harpe<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Cours de Litterature</hi>.</note> and Colman<note place="foot">Colman’s <hi rend="italic">Terence</hi>.</note>, and +as indeed must be felt by every one who reads the play, this +termination is scarcely consistent with the manners of gentlemen, +and it implies the utmost meanness in Phædria to +admit him into his society, or to allow him a share in the +favours of his mistress, merely that he may defray part of the +expense of her establishment. +</p> + +<p> +The drama, however, is full of vivacity and intrigue. +Through the whole piece the author amuses us with his +pleasantries, and in no scene discovers that his fund of entertainment +is exhausted. Most of the characters, too, are happily +sketched. Under Thais, Menander is supposed to have given +a representation of his own mistress Glycerium. On the general +nature of the parts of the parasite and braggart captain, +something has been said while treating of the dramas of +Plautus; but Terence has greatly refined and improved on +these favourite characters of his predecessor. Gnatho is master +of a much more delicate and artful mode of adulation than +former flatterers, and supports his consequence with his patron, +at the same time that he laughs at him and lives on him. He +boasts, in the second scene of the second act, that he is the +founder of a new class of parasites, who ingratiated themselves +with men of fortune and shallow understandings, solely +by humouring their fancies and admiring what they said, instead +of earning a livelihood by submitting to blows, the +ridicule of the company, and all manner of indignities, like the +antiquated race of parasites whom Plautus describes as beaten, +kicked, and abused at pleasure:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Et hîc quidem, hercle, nisi qui colaphos perpeti</q></l> +<l>Potis parasitus, frangique aulas in caput,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vel ire extra portam trigeminam ad saccum libet.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +<pb n="182"/><anchor id="Pg182"/> + +<p> +The new parasite, of whom Gnatho may be considered as the +representative, had been delineated in the characters of +Theophrastus, and has more resemblance to Shakspeare’s +Osrick, or to the class of parasites described by Juvenal as +infesting the families of the Great in the latter ages of Rome<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satir.</hi> III.</note>. +Thraso, the braggart captain, in the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>, is ridiculous +enough to supply the audience with mirth, without indulging +in the extravagant bluster of Pyrgopolinices. A scene in the +fourth act gives the most lively representation of the conceit +and ridiculous vanity of this soldier, who, calling together a +few slaves, pretends to marshal and draw them up as if they +formed a numerous army, and assumes all the airs of a general. +This part is so contrived, that nothing could have more happily +tended to make him appear ridiculous though he says +nothing extravagant, or beyond what might naturally be expected +from the mouth of a coxcomb. One new feature in +Thraso’s character is his fondness for repeating his jests, and +passion for being admired as a wit no less than a warrior. +There is, perhaps, nowhere to be found a truer picture of the +fond and froward passion of love, than that which is given us +in the character of Phædria. Horace and Persius, when they +purposely set themselves to expose and exaggerate its follies, +could imagine nothing beyond it. The former, indeed, in +the third satire of his second book, where he has given a picture +of the irresolution of lovers, has copied part of the +dialogue introduced near the commencement of the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +The love, however, both of Phædria and Chærea is more +that of temperament than sentiment: Of consequence, the +<hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> is inferior to the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> in delicacy and tenderness; +but there are not wanting passages which excel in these higher +qualities. Addison has remarked<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Spectator</hi>, No. 170.</note>, that Phædria’s request to +his mistress, on leaving her for a few days, is inimitably beautiful +and natural— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 9"><q rend="post: none">Egone quid velim?</q></l> +<l>Cum Milite isto præsens, absens ut sies;</l> +<l>Dies noctesque me ames: me desideres:</l> +<l>Me somnies: me expectes: de me cogites:</l> +<l>Me speres: me te oblectes: mecum tota sis:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Meus fac sis postremo animus, quando ego sum tuus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This demand was rather exorbitant, and Thais had some reason +to reply—<hi rend="italic">Me miseram!</hi> +</p> + +<p> +There is an Italian imitation of the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> in <hi rend="italic">La Talanta</hi>, +a comedy by Aretine, in which the courtezan who gives +<pb n="183"/><anchor id="Pg183"/>the name to the play corresponds with Thais, and her lover +Orfinio to Phædria,—the characteristic dispositions of both +the originals being closely followed in the copy. A youth, +from his disguise supposed to be a girl, is presented to La +Talanta by Tinca, the Thraso of the piece, who, being exasperated +at the treatment he had received from the courtezan, +meditates, like Thraso, a military attack on her dwelling-house; +and, though easily repulsed, he is permitted at the +conclusion, in respect of his wealth and bounty, to continue +to share with Orfinio the favours of La Talanta. +</p> + +<p> +There is more <hi rend="italic">lubricity</hi> in the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> of Terence, than +in any of his other performances; and hence, perhaps, it has +been selected by Fontaine as the most suitable drama for his +imitation. His <hi rend="italic">Eunuque</hi>, as he very justly remarks in his +advertisement prefixed, <q>n’est qu’une mediocre copie d’un +excellent original.</q> Fontaine, instead of adapting the incidents +to Parisian manners, like Moliere and Regnard, in +their delightful imitations of Plautus, has retained the ancient +names, and scene of action. The earlier part is a mere translation +from the Latin, except that the character of Thais is +softened down from a courtezan to a coquette. The next +deviation from the original is the omission of the recital by +Chærea, of the success of his audacious enterprize—instead of +which, Fontaine has introduced his Chærea professing honourable +and respectful love to Pamphile. In the unravelling of +the dramatic plot, the French author has departed widely +from Terence. There is nothing of the alarm concerning +Chærea given by Thais’ maid to Parmeno, and by him communicated +to the father: The old man merely solicits Parmeno +to prevail on his sons to marry:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Il se veut desormais tenir clos et couvert,</q></l> +<l>Caresser, les pieds chauds, quelque Bru qui lui plaise,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Conter son jeune temps, et banqueter a son aise.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This wish is doubly accomplished, by the discovery that Pamphile +is of reputable birth, and by Phædria’s reconciliation +with Thais. While making such changes on the conclusion, +and accommodating it in some measure to the feelings of the +age, I am surprised that the French author retained that part +of the compact with Thraso, by which he is to remain in the +society of Phædria merely to be fleeced and ridiculed. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> is also the origin of <hi rend="italic">Le Muet</hi> by Bruyes and +Palaprat, who laboured in conjunction, like our Beaumont and +Fletcher, and who have made such alterations on the Latin +drama as they thought advisable in their age and country. In +this play, which was first acted in 1691, a young man, who +<pb n="184"/><anchor id="Pg184"/>feigns to be dumb, is introduced as a page in a house where +his mistress resided. But although an Ethiopian eunuch, +which was an article of state among the ancients, may have +attracted the fancy of Thais, it is not probable that the French +countess should have been so desirous to receive a present of +a dumb page. Those scenes in which the credulous father is +made to believe that his son had lost the power of speech, +from the effects of love and sorcery, and is persuaded, by a +valet disguised as a doctor, that the only remedy for his +dumbness is an immediate union with the object of his passion, +are improbable and overcharged. The character of the +parasite is omitted, and instead of Thraso we have a rough +blunt sea captain, who had protected Zayde when lost by her +parents. +</p> + +<p> +The only English imitation of the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> is <hi rend="italic">Bellamira, +or the Mistress</hi>, an unsuccessful comedy by Sir Charles Sedley, +first printed in 1687. In this play the scene lies in London, +but there is otherwise hardly any variation in the incidents; +and there is no novelty introduced, except Bellamira and +Merryman’s plot of robbing Dangerfield, the braggart captain +of the piece, an incident evidently borrowed from Shakspeare’s +Henry IV. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Heautontimorumenos</hi>. The chief plot of this play, which I +think on the whole the least happy effort of Terence’s imitation, +and which, of all his plays, is the most foreign from our +manners, is taken, like the last-mentioned drama, from Menander. +It derives its Greek appellation from the voluntary punishment +inflicted on himself by a father, who, having driven +his son into banishment by excess of severity, avenges him, +by retiring to the country, where he partakes only of the hardest +fare, and labours the ground with his own hands. The +deep parental distress, however, of Menedemus, with which +the play opens, forms but an inconsiderable part of it, as the +son, Clinia, returns in the second act, and other incidents of +a comic cast are then interwoven with the drama. The plan +of Clitopho’s mistress being brought to the house both of +Menedemus and his neighbour Chremes, in the character of +Clinia’s mistress, has given rise to some amusing situations: +but the devices adopted by the slave Syrus, to deceive and +cheat the two old men, are too intricate, and much less ingenious +than those of a similar description in most other Latin +plays. One of his artifices, however, in order to melt the +heart of Chremes, by persuading him that Clitopho thinks he is +not his son, has been much applauded; particularly the preparation +for this stratagem, where, wisely concluding that one +would best contribute to the imposition who was himself de<pb n="185"/><anchor id="Pg185"/>ceived, he, in the first place, makes Clitopho believe that he +is not the son of his reputed father. +</p> + +<p> +Terence himself, in his prologue, has called this play <hi rend="italic">double</hi>, +probably in allusion to the two plots which it contains. Julius +Scaliger absurdly supposes that it was so termed because one +half of the play was represented in the evening, and the other +half on the following morning<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Poet.</hi> Lib. VI. c. 3.</note>. It has been more plausibly +conjectured, that the original plot of the Greek play was simple, +consisting merely of the character of the Self-tormentor +Menedemus, the love of his son Clinia for Antiphila, and the +discovery of the real condition of his mistress; but that Terence +had added to this single fable, either from his own +invention, or from some other Greek play, the passion of Clitopho +for Bacchis, and the devices of the slave in order to +extract money from old Chremes<note place="foot">Signorelli, <hi rend="italic">Storia de Teatri</hi>, Tom. II. p. 129.</note>. These two fables are +connected by the poet with much art, and form a double +intrigue, instead of the simple argument of the Greek original. +</p> + +<p> +Diderot has objected strongly to the principal subject which +gives name to this play, and to the character of the self-tormenting +father. Tragedy, he says, represents individual characters, +like those of Regulus, Orestes, and Cato; but the +chief characters in comedy should represent a class or species, +and if they only resemble individuals, the comic drama +would revert to what it was in its infancy.—<q>Mais on peut +dire,</q> continues he, <q>que ce pere là n’est pas dans la nature. +Une grande ville fourniroit a peine dans un siecle l’example +d’une affliction aussi bizarre.</q> It is observed in the <hi rend="italic">Spectator</hi><note place="foot">No. 562.</note>, +on the other hand, that though there is not in the whole +drama one passage that could raise a laugh, it is from beginning +to end the most perfect picture of human life that ever +was exhibited. +</p> + +<p> +There has been a great contest, particularly among the +French critics, whether the unities of time and place be preserved +in <hi rend="italic">Heautontimorumenos</hi>. In the year 1640, Menage +had a conversational dispute, on this subject, with the Abbé +D’Aubignac, with whom he at that period lived on terms of +the most intimate friendship. The latter, who contended for +the strictest interpretation of the unities, first put his arguments +in writing, but without his name, in his <q>Discours sur +la troisieme comedie de Terence; contre ceux qui pensent +qu’elle n’est pas dans les regles anciennes du poeme dramatique.</q> +Menage answered him in his <q>Reponse au <anchor id="corr185"/><corr sic="discours,'">discours,</corr></q> +&c.; and, in 1650, he published both in his <hi rend="italic">Miscellanea</hi>, +<pb n="186"/><anchor id="Pg186"/>without leave of the author of the <hi rend="italic">Discours</hi>. This, and some +disrespectful expressions employed in the <hi rend="italic">Reponse</hi>, gave mortal +offence to the Abbé, who, in 1655, wrote a reply to the +answer, entitled <q>Terence Justifié, &c. contre les Erreurs de +Maistre Gilles Menage, Avocat en Parlement.</q> This designation +of <hi rend="italic">Maistre</hi>, proved intolerable to the feelings of Menage. +Hearing that the tract was full of injurious expressions, +he declared publicly and solemnly, that he never would read +it; but being afterwards urged to peruse it by some good-natured +friends, he consulted the casuists of the Sorbonne, +and the College of Jesuits, on the point of conscience; and +having at last read it with their approval, he wrote a full +reply, which was not published till after the death of his +opponent. +</p> + +<p> +In these various tracts, it was maintained by the Abbé, +that unity of time was most strictly preserved in the <hi rend="italic">Heautontimorumenos</hi>, +as a less period than twelve hours was supposed +to pass during the representation, the longest space to which, +by the rules of the drama, it could be legitimately prolonged. +Of course he adduces arguments and citations, tending to +restrict, as far as possible, the period of the dramatic action. +In the third scene of the second act, it is said <hi rend="italic">vesperascit</hi>, +and in the first scene of the third act, <hi rend="italic">Luciscit hoc jam</hi>. +Now the Abbé, giving to the term <hi rend="italic">vesperascit</hi> the signification, +<q>It is already night,</q> was of opinion, that the action +commenced as late as seven or eight in the evening, when +Menedemus returned to Athens from his farm; that the scene +of the drama is supposed to pass during the Pithœgia, or festivals +of Bacchus, held in April, at which season not more +than nine hours intervened between twilight and dawn; that +the festival continued the whole night, and that none of the +characters went to bed, so that the continuity of action was +no more broken than the unity of time. Menage, on the +other hand, contended that at least fifteen hours must be +granted to the dramatic action, but that this extension implied +no violation of the dramatic unities, which, according to the +precepts of Aristotle, would not have been broken, even if +twenty-four hours had been allotted. He successfully shews, +however, that fifteen hours, at least, must be allowed. According +to him, the play opens early in the evening, while +Menedemus is yet labouring in his field. The festivals were +in February; and he proves, from a minute examination, that +the incidents which follow after it is declared that <hi rend="italic">luciscit</hi>, +must have occupied fully three hours. Some of the characters, +he thinks, retired to rest, but no void was thereby left +in the action, as the two lovers, Bacchis, and the slaves, sat +<pb n="187"/><anchor id="Pg187"/>up arranging their amorous stratagems. Madame Dacier +adopted the opinion of Aubignac, which she fortified by reference +to a wood engraving in a very ancient MS. in the +Royal Library, which represents Menedemus as having quitted +his work in the fields, and as bearing away his implements +of husbandry. +</p> + +<p> +The poet being perhaps aware that the action of this comedy +was exceptionable, and that the dramatic unities were +not preserved in the most rigid sense of the term, has apparently +exerted himself to compensate for these deficiencies by +the introduction of many beautiful moral maxims: and by +that purity of style, which distinguishes all his productions, +but which shines, perhaps, most brightly in the <hi rend="italic">Heautontimorumenos</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +That part of the plot of this comedy, where Clitopho’s mistress +is introduced as Clinia’s mistress, into the house of both +the old men, has given rise to Chapman’s comedy, <hi rend="italic">All Fooles</hi>, +which was first printed in 1605, 4to., and was a favourite +production in its day. In this play, by the contrivance of +Rynaldo, the younger son of Marc Antonio, a lady called +Gratiana, privately married to his elder brother Fortunio, is +introduced, and allowed to remain for some time at the house +of their father, by persuading him that she is the wife of +Valerio, the son of one of his neighbours, who had married +her against his parent’s inclination, and that it would be an +act of kindness to give her shelter, till a reconciliation could +be effected. By this means Fortunio enjoys the society of his +bride, and Valerio, her pretended husband, has, at the same +time, an admirable opportunity of continuing his courtship of +Bellonora, the daughter of Marc Antonio. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>.—The principal subject of this drama is usually +supposed to have been taken from Menander’s <hi rend="italic">Adelphoi</hi>; but +it appears that Alexis, the uncle of Menander, also wrote a +comedy, entitled <hi rend="italic">Adelphoi</hi>; so that perhaps the elegant Latin +copy may have been as much indebted to the uncle’s as to the +nephew’s performance, for the delicacy of its characters and +the charms of its dialogue. We are informed, however, in +the prologue, that the part of the drama in which the music +girl is carried off from the pander, has been taken from the +<hi rend="italic">Synapothnescontes</hi> of Diphilus. That comedy, though the +version is now lost, had been translated by Plautus, under the +title of <hi rend="italic">Commorientes</hi>. He had left out the incidents, however, +concerning the music girl, and Terence availed himself +of this omission to interweave them with the principal plot of +his delightful drama—<q>Minus existimans laudis proprias scribere +quam Græcas transferre.</q></p> +<pb n="188"/><anchor id="Pg188"/> +<p>The title, which is supposed to be imperfect, is derived +from two brothers, on whose contrasted characters the chief +subject and amusement of the piece depend. Demea, the +elder, who lived in the country, had past his days in thrift and +labour, and was remarkable for his severe penurious disposition. +Micio, the younger brother, was, on the contrary, distinguished +by his indulgent and generous temper. Being a +bachelor, he had adopted Æschinus, his brother’s eldest son, +whom he brought up without laying much restraint on his +conduct. Ctesipho, the other son of Demea, was educated +with great strictness by his father, who boasted of the regular +and moral behaviour of this child, which, as he thought, was +so strongly contrasted with the excesses of him who had been +reared under the charge of his brother. Æschinus at length +carries off a music girl from the slave-merchant, in whose +possession she was. Hence fresh indignation on the part of +Demea, and new self-congratulation on the system of education +he had pursued with Ctesipho: Hence, too, the deepest +distress on the part of an unfortunate girl, to whom Æschinus +had promised marriage; and also of her relations, at this proof +of his alienated affections. At last, however, it is discovered +that Æschinus had run off with the music girl, for the sake, +and at the instigation, of his brother Ctesipho. The play accordingly +concludes with the union of Æschinus and the girl +to whom he was betrothed, and the total change of disposition +on the part of Demea, who now becomes so complete a +convert to the system of Micio, that he allows his son to retain +the music girl as his mistress. +</p> + +<p> +The plot of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> may thus be perhaps considered as +double; but the interest which Æschinus takes in Ctesipho’s +amour, combines their loves so naturally, that they can hardly +be considered as distinct or separate; and the details by which +the plot is carried on, are managed with such infinite skill, +that the intrigue of at least four acts of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> is more +artfully conducted than that of any other piece of Terence. +At the commencement of the play, Micio summons his servant +Storax, whom he had sent to find out Æschinus; but as +the servant does not appear, Micio concludes that the youth +had not yet returned from the place where he had supped on +the preceding evening, and is in consequence overwhelmed +with all the tender anxiety of a father concerning an absent +son. This alarm gives us some insight into the character of +the young man, and explains the interest Micio takes in his +welfare, without shewing too plainly the art and design of the +author. His uneasiness, by naturally leading him to reflect on +the situation of the family, and the doubtful part he had him<pb n="189"/><anchor id="Pg189"/>self acted, brings in less awkwardly than usual one of those +long soliloquies, in which the domestic affairs of the speaker +are explained by him for the sake of the audience. Demea is +then introduced, having just learned, on his arrival in the city, +that Æschinus had carried off the music girl. His character +and predominant feelings are finely marked in the account +which he gives of this outrage, dwelling on every minute particular, +and exaggerating the offences of Æschinus. This +passage, too, acquires additional zest and relish, on a second +perusal of the play, when it is known that the son so much commended +is chiefly in fault. The grief of the mother of the +girl, who was betrothed to Æschinus, and the honest indignation +of her faithful old servant Geta, are highly interesting. +The interview of Micio with his adopted son, after he had discovered +the circumstances of this connection, is eminently +beautiful. His delicate reproof for the young man’s want of +confidence, in not communicating to him the state of his heart—the +touches of good humour, mildness, and affection, which +may be traced in every line of Micio’s part of the dialogue, as +well as the natural bursts of passion, and ingenuous shame, in +Æschinus, are perhaps more characteristic of the tender and +elegant genius of Terence, than any other scene in his dramas. +But the triumph of comic art, is the gradation of Demea’s anger +and distresses—his perfect conviction of the sobriety of +his son, who, he is persuaded by Syrus, had shewn the utmost +indignation at the conduct of Æschinus, and had gone to the +country in disgust, when in fact he was at that moment seated +at a feast—then his perplexity on not finding him at the farm, +and his learning that Æschinus, having violated a free citizen, +was about to be married to her, though she had no portion. +Even his meeting Syrus intoxicated augments his rage, at the +general libertinism and extravagance of the family. At length +the climax of events is finally completed, by discovering that +the music girl had been carried off for the sake of his favourite +son, and by finding him at a carousal with his brother’s dissolute +family. +</p> + +<p> +With this incident the fable naturally concludes, and it is +perhaps to be regretted that Terence had not also ended the +drama with the third scene of the fifth act, where Demea +breaks in upon the entertainment. The conversion of Demea, +indeed, with which the remaining scenes are occupied, +grows out of the preceding events. He had met, during the +course of the play, with many mortifications—his anger, complaints, +and advice, had been all neglected and slighted—he +had seen his brother loved and followed, and found himself +shunned; but such a change in long-confirmed habits could +<pb n="190"/><anchor id="Pg190"/>hardly have been effected in so short a period, or by a single +lesson, however striking and important. His complaisance, +too, is awkward, and his generosity is evidently about to run +into profusion. +</p> + +<p> +But if all this be an impropriety, what shall we say of the +gross absurdity of Micio, a bachelor of sixty-five, marrying an +old woman, the mother of Æschinus’ bride, (and whom he had +never seen but once,) merely out of complaisance to his friends, +who seemed to have no motive in making the request, except +that she was quite solitary, had nobody to care for her, and +was long past child-bearing— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Parere jam diu hæc per annos non potest:</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nec, qui eam respiciat, quisquam est; sola est.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Micio had all along been represented as possessed of so much +judgment, good sense, and knowledge of the world, that this +last piece of extravagance destroys the interest we had previously +felt in the character. Donatus, who has given us some +curious information in his excellent commentary on Terence, +with regard to the manner in which he had altered his comedies +from the original Greek, says, that in the play of Menander, +the old Bachelor has no reluctance at entering into a state +of matrimony.—<q>Apud Menandrum, Senex de nuptiis non +gravatur.</q> The English translator of Terence thinks, that +the Latin poet, by making Micio at first express a repugnance +to the proposed match, has improved on his model; but it appears +to me, that this only makes his unbounded complaisance +more improbable and ridiculous. Indeed the incongruity and +inconsistence of the concluding scenes of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, have +been considered so great, that a late German translator of +Terence has supposed that they did not form a component part +of the regular comedy, but were in fact the <hi rend="italic">Exodium</hi>, a sort +of afterpiece, in which the characters of the preceding play +were usually represented in grotesque situations, and with +overcharged colours<note place="foot"><anchor id="corr190"/><corr sic="Schmeider">Schmieder</corr>—Terenz. Halle, 1794.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +So much for the plot of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, and the incidents by +which the conclusion is brought about. With regard to the +characters of the piece, Æschinus is an excellent delineation +of the elegant ease and indifference of a fine gentleman. In +one scene, however, he is represented as a lover, full of tenderness, +and keenly alive to all the anxieties, fears, and emotions +of the passion by which he is affected. In the parts of Demea +and Micio, the author has violated the precept of Horace with +regard to a dramatic character: +</p> + +<pb n="191"/><anchor id="Pg191"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 10">—— <q rend="post: none">Servetur ad imum</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Qualis ab incepto processerit, et sibi constet.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +During four acts, however, the churlishness of Demea is well +contrasted with the mildness of Micio, whose fondness and partiality +for his adopted son are extremely pleasing. <q>One +great theatrical resource,</q> says Gibbon, <q>is the opposition +and contrast of characters which thus display each other. The +severity of Demea, and easiness of Micio, throw mutual light; +and we could not be so well acquainted with the misanthropy +of Alceste, were it not for the fashionable complaisant character +of Philinte<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Miscellaneous Works</hi>, Vol. IV. p. 140.</note>.</q> Accordingly, in the modern drama, we +often find, that if one of the lovers be a gay companion, the +other is grave and serious; like Frankly and Bellamy, in the +<hi rend="italic">Suspicious Husband</hi>, or Absolute and Faulkland in the <hi rend="italic">Rivals</hi>. +Yet in the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, the contrast, perhaps, is too direct, and too +constantly obtruded on the attention of the audience. It has +the appearance of what is called antithesis in writing, and, in +the conduct of the drama, has the same effect as that figure in +composition. Diderot, in his <hi rend="italic">Essay on Dramatic Poetry</hi>, also +objects to these two contrasted characters, that, being drawn +with equal force, the moral intention of the drama is rendered +equivocal; and that we have something of the same feeling +which every one has experienced while reading the <hi rend="italic">Misanthrope</hi> +of Moliere, in which we can never tell whether Alceste +or Philinte is most in the right, or, more properly speaking, +farthest in the wrong.—<q>On diroit,</q> continues he, <q>au commencement +du cinquieme acte des <hi rend="italic">Adelphes</hi>, que l’auteur, embarassé +du contraste qu’il avoit etabli, a été contraint d’abandonner +son but et de renverser l’interet de sa piece. Mais +qu’est il arrivé: c’est qu’on ne scait plus a qui s’interesser; et +qu’apres avoit eté pour Micion contre Demea, on finit sans +savoir pour qui l’on est. On desireroit presque un troisieme +pere qui tint le milieu entre ces deux personnages, et qui en fit +connoitre le vice.</q> +</p> + +<p> +It is not unlikely, however, that this sort of uncertainty +was just the intention of Terence, or rather of Menander. It +was probably their design to show the disadvantages resulting +from each mode of education pursued, and hence, by an easy +inference, to point out the golden mean which ought to be +preserved by fathers; for, if Demea be unreasonably severe, +the indulgence of Micio is excessive, and his connivance at +the disorders of Ctesipho, which he even assisted him to support, +is as reprehensible, as the extraordinary sentiment which +he utters at the commencement of the comedy:— +</p> + +<pb n="192"/><anchor id="Pg192"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Non est flagitium, mihi crede, adolescentulum</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Scortari, neque potare; non est: neque fores effringere.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This, though the breaking doors was an ordinary piece of +gallantry, is, it must be confessed, rather loose morality. But +some of the sentiments in the drama are equally remarkable +for their propriety, and the knowledge they discover of the +feelings and circumstances of mankind; as, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Omnes, quibus res sunt minus secundæ, magis sunt, nescio quomodo,</q></l> +<l>Suspiciosi: ad contumeliam omnia accipiunt magis;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Propter suam impotentiam se semper credunt negligi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And afterwards,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ita vita ’st hominum, quasi, quum ludas tesseris;</q></l> +<l>Si illud, quod maxime opus est jactu, non cadit,</l> +<l>Illud, quod cecidit forte, id arte ut corrigas.</l> +<l> * * * * *</l> +<l>Nunquam ita quisquam bene subducta ratione ad vitam fuit,</l> +<l>Quin res, ætas, usus, semper aliquid adportet novi,</l> +<l>Aliquid moneat, ut illa, quæ te scire credas, nescias;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Et quæ tibi putâris prima, in experiundo repudies.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +A play possessing so many excellencies as the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, +could scarcely fail to be frequently imitated by modern dramatists. +It has generally been said, that Moliere borrowed +from the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> his comedy <hi rend="italic">L’Ecole des Maris</hi>, where the +brothers Sganarelle and Ariste, persons of very opposite dispositions, +bring up two young ladies intrusted to their care on +different systems; the one allowing a proper liberty—the other, +who wished to marry his ward, employing a constant restraint, +which, however, did not prevent her from contriving to elope +with a favoured lover. The chief resemblance consists in the +characters of the two guardians—in some of the discussions, +which they hold together on their opposite systems of management—and +some observations in soliloquy on each other’s +folly. Thus, for example, Demea, the severe brother in Terence, +exclaims: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 14">—— <q rend="post: none">O Jupiter,</q></l> +<l>Hanccine vitam! hoscine mores! hanc dementiam!</l> +<l>Uxor sine dote veniet: intus Psaltria est:</l> +<l>Domus sumptuosa: adolescens luxu perditus:</l> +<l>Senex delirans. Ipsa, si cupiat, Salus,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Servare prorsus non potest hanc familiam<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Adelph.</hi> Act 4. sc. 7.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In like manner, Sganarelle, the corresponding character in +Moliere:— +</p> + +<pb n="193"/><anchor id="Pg193"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quelle belle famille! un vieillard insensé!</q></l> +<l>Une fille maitresse et coquette suprême!</l> +<l>Des valets impudents! Non, la Sagesse même</l> +<l>N’en viendroit pas à bout, perdroit sens et raison,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">A vouloir corriger une telle maison<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ecole des Maris</hi>, Act 1. sc. 2.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Indeed, were it not for the minute resemblance of particular +passages, I would think it as likely, that Moliere had been +indebted for the leading idea of his comedy to the second +tale of the eighth night of Straparola, an Italian novelist of +the sixteenth century, from whom he unquestionably borrowed +the plot of his admirable comedy, <hi rend="italic">L’Ecole des Femmes</hi>. The +principal amusement, however, in the <hi rend="italic">Ecole des Maris</hi>, which +consists of Isabelle complaining to her guardian, Sganarelle, +of her lover, Valere, has been suggested by the third novel, +in the third day of Boccaccio’s <hi rend="italic">Decameron</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +A much closer imitation of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> than the <hi rend="italic">Ecole des +Maris</hi> of Moliere may be found in the <hi rend="italic">Ecole des Peres</hi>, by +Baron, author of the <hi rend="italic">Andrienne</hi>. The genius of this celebrated +actor seems to have been constrained by copying from +Terence, which has deprived his drama of all air of originality, +while, at the same time, his alterations are such as to render +it but an imperfect image of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>. It were, therefore, +to be wished, that he had adhered more closely to the Roman +poet, or, like Moliere, deviated from him still farther. His +exhibition of Clarice and Pamphile, the mistresses of the two +young men, on the stage, has no better effect than the introduction +of Glycerium in his <hi rend="italic">Andrienne</hi>. The characters of +Telamon and Alcée are so altered, as to preserve neither the +strength nor delicacy of those of Micio and Demea; while the +change of disposition, which the severe father undergoes in +the fifth act, has been neither rejected nor retained: He accedes +to the proposals for his children’s happiness, but his +complaisance is evidently forced and sarcastic; and he ultimately, +in a fit of bad humour, breaks off all connection with +his family: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">J’abandonne les Brus, les Enfans, et le Frere;</q></l> +<l>Je ne saurois deja les souffrir sans horreur,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Et je les donne tous au diable de bon cœur.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Diderot had evidently his eye on the characters of Micio +and Demea in drawing those of M. d’Orbesson and Le Commandeur, +in his <hi rend="italic">Comedie Larmoyante</hi>, entitled <hi rend="italic">Le Pere de +Famille</hi>. The scenes between the Pere de Famille and his +son, St Albin, who had long secretly visited Sophie, an un<pb n="194"/><anchor id="Pg194"/>known girl in indigent circumstances, seem formed on the +beautiful dialogue, already mentioned, which passes between +Micio and his adopted child. +</p> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> is also the origin of Shadwell’s comedy, the +<hi rend="italic">Squire of Alsatia</hi>. Spence, in his <hi rend="italic">Anecdotes</hi><note place="foot">Page 115.</note>, says, on the +authority of Dennis the critic, that the story on which the +<hi rend="italic">Squire of Alsatia</hi> was built, was a true fact. That the whole +plot is founded on fact, I think very improbable, as it coincides +most closely with that of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>. Sir William and Sir +Edward Belfond are the two brothers, while Belfond senior +and junior correspond to Æschinus and Ctesipho. The chief +alteration, and that to which Dennis probably alluded, is +the importance of the part assigned to Belfond senior; who, +having come to London, is beset and cozened by all sorts of +bankrupts and cheats, inhabitants of Alsatia, (Whitefriars,) +and by their stratagems is nearly inveigled into a marriage +with Mrs Termagant, a woman of infamous character, and +furious temper. The part of Belfond junior is much less +agreeable than that of Æschinus. His treatment of Lucia +evinces, in the conclusion, a hard-hearted infidelity, which we +are little disposed to pardon, especially as we feel no interest +in his new mistress, Isabella. On the whole, though the plots +be nearly the same, the tone of feeling and sentiment are very +different, and the English comedy is as remote from the Latin +original, as the grossest vulgarity can be from the most simple +and courtly elegance. The <hi rend="italic">Squire of Alsatia</hi>, however, took +exceedingly at first as an occasional play. It discovered the +cant terms, that were before not generally known, except to +cheats themselves; and was a good deal instrumental towards +causing the great nest of villains in the metropolis to be regulated +by public authority<note place="foot">Spence’s <hi rend="italic">Anec.</hi> p. 115.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +In Cumberland’s <hi rend="italic">Choleric Man</hi>, the chief characters, though +he seems to deny it in his dedicatory epistle to Detraction, +have also been traced after those of the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>. The love +intrigues, indeed, are different; but the parts of the half-brothers, +Manlove and Nightshade, (the choleric-man,) are +evidently formed on those of Micio and Demea; while the +contrasted education, yet similar conduct, of the two sons of +Nightshade, one of whom had been adopted by Manlove, and +the father’s rage on detecting his favourite son in an amorous +intrigue, have been obviously suggested by the behaviour of +Æschinus and Ctesipho. +</p> + +<p> +The philanthropic speeches of Micio have been a constant +<pb n="195"/><anchor id="Pg195"/>resource both to the French dramatists and our own, and it +would be endless to specify the various imitations of his sentiments. +Those of Kno’well, in Ben Jonson’s <hi rend="italic">Every Man in +his Humour</hi>, have a particular resemblance to them. His +speech, beginning— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>There is a way of winning more by love<note place="foot">Act 1. sc. 1.</note>,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +is evidently formed on the celebrated passage in Terence,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Pudore et liberalitate liberos,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>—Several of Terence’s plays can hardly be accounted +comedies, if by that term be understood, dramas which +excite laughter. They are in what the French call the <hi rend="italic">genre +serieux</hi>, and are perhaps the origin of the <hi rend="italic">comedie larmoyante</hi>. +The events of human life, for the most part, are neither deeply +distressing nor ridiculous; and, in a dramatic representation +of such incidents, the action must advance by embarrassments +and perplexities, which, though below tragic pathos, are not +calculated to excite merriment. Diderot, who seems to have +been a great student of the works of Terence, thinks the <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>, +or Mother-in-law, should be classed among the serious +dramas. It exhibits no buffoonery, or tricks of slaves, or ridiculous +parasite, or extravagant braggart captain; but contains +a beautiful and delightful picture of private life, and those +distresses which ruffle <q>the smooth current of domestic joy.</q> +It was taken from a play of Apollodorus; but, as Donatus informs +us, was abridged from the Greek comedy,—many things +having been represented in the original, which, in the imitation, +are only related. In the <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>, a young man, called +Pamphilus, had long refused to marry, on account of his +attachment to the courtezan Bacchis. He is at length, however, +constrained by his father to choose a wife, whose gentleness +and modest behaviour soon wean his affections from his +mistress. Pamphilus being obliged to leave home for some +time, his wife, on pretence of a quarrel with her mother-in-law, +quits his father’s house; and Pamphilus, on his return +home, finds, that she had given birth to a child, of which he +supposed that he could not have been the father. His wife’s +mother begs him to conceal her disgrace, which he promises; +and affecting extraordinary filial piety, assigns as his reason +for not bringing her home, the capricious behaviour of which +she had been guilty towards his mother. That lady, in con<pb n="196"/><anchor id="Pg196"/>sequence, offers to retire to the country. Pamphilus is thus +reduced to the utmost perplexity; and all plausible excuses for +not receiving his wife having failed, his father suspects that +he had renewed his intercourse with Bacchis. He, accordingly, +sends for that courtezan, who denies the present existence +of any correspondence with his son; and, being eager +to clear the character as well as to secure the happiness of +her former lover, she offers to confirm her testimony before +the family of the wife of Pamphilus. During the interview +which she in consequence obtains, that lady’s mother perceives +on her hand a ring which had once belonged to her +daughter, and which Bacchis now acknowledges to have +received from Pamphilus, as one which he had taken from a +girl whom he had violated, but had never seen. It is thus +discovered by Pamphilus, that the lady to whom he had offered +this injury before marriage was his own wife, and that he himself +was father of the child to whom she had just given birth. +</p> + +<p> +The fable of this play is more simple than that of Terence’s +other performances, in all of which he had recourse to the +expedient of double plots. This, perhaps, was partly the +reason of its want of success on its first and second representations. +When first brought forward, in the year 589, it was +interrupted by the spectators leaving the theatre, attracted by +the superior interest of a boxing-match, and rope-dancers. A +combat of gladiators had the like unfortunate effect when it +was attempted to be again exhibited, in 594. The celebrated +actor, L. Ambivius, encouraged by the success which he had +experienced in reviving the condemned plays of Cæcilius, +ventured to produce it a third time on the stage<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Prolog. in Hecyr.</hi> and Donati <hi rend="italic">Comment.</hi></note>, when it +received a patient hearing, and was frequently repeated. +Still, however, most of the old critics and commentators speak +of it as greatly inferior to the other plays of Terence. Bishop +Hurd, on the contrary, in his notes on Horace, maintains, that +it is the only one of his comedies which is written in the true +ancient Grecian style; and that, for the genuine beauty of +dramatic design, as well as the nice coherence of the fable, +it must appear to every reader of true taste, the most masterly +and exquisite of the whole collection. Some scenes are doubtless +very finely wrought up,—as that between Pamphilus and +his mother, after he first suspects the disgrace of his wife, and +that in which it is revealed to him by his wife’s mother. The +passage in the second scene of the first act, containing the +picture of an amiable wife, who has succeeded in effacing +from the heart of her husband the love of a dissolute cour<pb n="197"/><anchor id="Pg197"/>tezan, has been highly admired. But, notwithstanding these +partial beauties, and the much-applauded simplicity of the +plot, there is, I think, great want of skilful management in +the conduct of the fable; and if the outline be beautiful, it +certainly is not so well filled up as might have been expected +from the taste of the author. In the commencement, he introduces +the superfluous part of Philotis, (who has no concern +in the plot, and never appears afterwards,) merely to +listen to the narrative of the circumstances and situation of +those who are principal persons in the drama. It is likewise +somewhat singular, that Pamphilus, when told by the mother +of the injury done to his wife, should not have remembered +his own adventure, and thus been led to suspect the real circumstances. +This communication, too, ought, as it probably +did in the Greek original, to have formed a scene between +Pamphilus and his wife’s mother; but, instead of this, Pamphilus +is introduced relating to himself the whole discourse +which had just passed between them. At length, the issue +of the fable is disclosed by another long soliloquy from the +courtezan. Indeed, all the plays of Terence abound in soliloquies +very inartificially introduced; and there is none of them +in which he has so much erred in this way as in the <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>. +The wife of Pamphilus, too, the character calculated to give +most interest, does not appear at all on the stage; and the +whole play is consumed in contests between the mother-in-law +and the two fathers. The characters of these old men,—the +fathers of Pamphilus and his wife,—so far from being contrasted, +as in the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, have scarcely a shade of difference. +Both are covetous and passionate; very ready to vent their +bad humour on their wives and children, and very ready to +exculpate them when blamed by others. The uncommon and +delicate situation in which Pamphilus is placed, exhibits him +in an interesting and favourable point of view. He wishes +to conceal what had occurred, yet is scarcely able to dissemble. +Parmeno, the slave of Pamphilus, a lazy inquisitive character, +is humorously kept, through the whole course of the play, in +continual employment, and total ignorance. Sostrata’s mild +character, and the excellent behaviour of Bacchis, show, that +in this play, Terence had attempted an innovation, by introducing +a good mother-in-law, and an honest courtezan, whose +object was to acquire a reputation of not resembling those of +her profession. It appears from the Letters of Alciphron and +from Athenæus, that there actually was a Greek courtezan of +the name of Bacchis, distinguished from others of her class, +in the time of Menander, by disinterestedness, and comparative +modesty of demeanour. This circumstance, added to the +<pb n="198"/><anchor id="Pg198"/>fact of Menander having written a play, entitled <hi rend="italic">Glycerium</hi>, +(which was the name of his mistress,) leads us to believe that +the Greek comedies sometimes represented, not merely the +general character of the courtezan, but individuals of that +profession; and that probably the Bacchis of Apollodorus, and +his imitator Terence, may have been the courtezan of this +name, who rejected the splendid offers of the Persian Satrap, +to remain the faithful mistress of the poor Meneclides<note place="foot">Alciphron, <hi rend="italic">Epistolæ</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi>—like the last mentioned play, was taken from the +Greek of Apollodorus, who called it <hi rend="italic">Epidicazomenos</hi>. Terence +named it <hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi>, from a parasite whose contrivances +form the groundwork of the comedy, and who connects its +double plot. In this play two brothers had gone abroad, +each leaving a son at home, one of whom was called Antipho, +and the other Phædria, under care of their servant Geta. +Antipho having fallen in love with a woman apparently of +mean condition, in order that he might marry her, yet at the +same time possess a plausible excuse to his father for his conduct, +persuades Phormio to assume the character of her patron. +Phormio accordingly brings a suit against Antipho, as +her nearest of kin, and he, having made no defence, is ordained +in this capacity, according to an Athenian law, to marry the +supposed orphan. About the same time, Phædria, the other +youth, had become enamoured of a music girl; but he had +no money with which to redeem her from the slave merchant. +The old men, on their return home, are much disconcerted by +the news of Antipho’s marriage, as it had been arranged between +them that he should espouse his cousin. Phormio, at +the suggestion of Geta, avails himself of this distress, in order +to procure money for redeeming Phædria’s music girl. He +consents to take Antipho’s wife home to himself, provided he +gets a portion with her, which being procured, is immediately +laid out in the purchase of Phædria’s mistress. After these +plots are accomplished, it is discovered that Antipho’s wife is +the daughter of his uncle, by a woman at Lemnos, with whom +he had an amour before marriage, and that she had come to +Athens during his absence in search of her father. This is +found out at the end of the third act, but the play is injudiciously +protracted, after the principal interest is exhausted, +with the endeavours of the old men to recover the portion +which had been given to Phormio, and the dread of Chremes +lest the story of his intrigue at Lemnos should come to the +knowledge of his wife. The play accordingly languishes after +the discovery, notwithstanding all the author’s attempts to +<pb n="199"/><anchor id="Pg199"/>support the interest of the piece by the force of pleasantry +and humour. +</p> + +<p> +The double plot of this play has been said to be united, by +both hingeing on the part of the parasite. But this is not a +sufficient union either in tragedy or comedy. I cannot, therefore, +agree with Colman, <q>that the construction of the fable +is extremely artful,</q> or that <q>it contains a vivacity of intrigue +perhaps even superior to that of the Eunuch, <hi rend="italic">particularly in +the catastrophe</hi>. The diction,</q> he continues, with more +truth, <q>is pure and elegant, and the first act as chastely written +as that of the <hi rend="italic">Self-Tormentor</hi> itself. The character of +Phormio is finely separated from that of Gnatho, and is better +drawn than the part of any parasite in Plautus. Nausistrata +is a lively sketch of a shrewish wife, as well as Chremes +an excellent draught of a hen-pecked husband, and more in the +style of the modern drama than perhaps any character in ancient +comedy, except the miser of Plautus. There are also +some particular scenes and passages deserving of all commendation, +as the description of natural and simple beauty in the +person of Fannia, and that in which Geta and Phædria try to +inspire some courage into Antipho, overwhelmed by the +sudden arrival of his father<note place="foot">Act 1. sc. 2.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +It is curious that this play, which Donatus says is founded +on passions almost too high for comedy, should have given +rise to the most farcical of all Moliere’s productions, <hi rend="italic">Les Fourberies +de Scapin</hi>. a celebrated, though at first, an unsuccessful +play, where, contrary to his usual practice, he has burlesqued +rather than added dignity to the incidents of the original +from which he borrowed. The plot, indeed, is but a frame to +introduce the various tricks of Scapin, who, after all, is a much +less agreeable cheat than Phormio: His deceptions are too +palpable, and the old men are incredible fools. As in Terence, +there are two fathers, Argante and Geronte, and during +the absence of the former, his son Octave falls in love with +and marries a girl, whom he had accidentally seen bewailing +the death of her mother. At the same time, Leandre, the son +of Geronte, becomes enamoured of an Egyptian, and Scapin, +the valet of Octave, is employed to excuse to the father the +conduct of his son, and to fleece him of as much money as +might be necessary to purchase her. The first of these objects +could not well be attained by Terence’s contrivance of the +law-suit; and it is therefore pretended that he had been forced +into the marriage by the lady’s brother, who was a bully, +(Spadassin,) and to whom the father agrees to give a large +<pb n="200"/><anchor id="Pg200"/>sum of money, that he might consent to the marriage being +dissolved. It is then discovered that the girl whom Octave +had married is the daughter of Geronte, and the Egyptian is +found out, by the usual expedient of a bracelet, to be the long +lost child of Argante. Many of the most amusing scenes and +incidents are also copied from Terence, as Scapin instructing +Octave to regulate his countenance and behaviour on the approach +of his father—his enumeration to the father of all the +different articles for which the brother of his son’s wife will +require money, and the accumulating rage of Argante at each +new <hi rend="italic">item</hi>. Some scenes, however, have been added, as that +where Leandre, thinking Scapin had betrayed him, and desiring +him to confess, obtains a catalogue of all the <hi rend="italic">Fourberies</hi> +he had committed since he entered his service, which is taken +from an Italian piece entitled <hi rend="italic">Pantalone, Padre di Famiglia</hi>. +He has also introduced from the <hi rend="italic">Pedant Joué</hi> of Cyrano Bergerac, +the device of Scapin for extorting money from Geronte, +which consists in pretending that his son, having accidentally +gone on board a Turkish galley, had been detained, and +would be inevitably carried captive to Algiers, unless instantly +ransomed. In this scene, which is the best of the play, the +struggle between habitual avarice and parental tenderness, +and the constant exclamation, <q><hi rend="italic">Que diable alloit il faire dans +cette galere du Turc</hi>,</q> are extremely amusing. Boileau has +reproached Moliere for having +</p> + +<lg> +<l><q>Sans honte à Terence allié Tabarin,</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +in allusion to the scene where Scapin persuades Geronte that +the brother, accompanied by a set of bullies, is in search of +him, and stuffs him, for concealment, into a sack, which he +afterwards beats with a stick. This is compounded of two +scenes in the French farces, the <hi rend="italic">Piphagne</hi> and the <hi rend="italic">Francisquine</hi> +of Tabarin, and, like the originals from which it is derived, +is quite farcical and extravagant:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Dans ce sac ridicule ou Scapin s’enveloppe,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Je ne reconnois plus l’auteur du Misanthrope<note place="foot">Boileau.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The chief improvement which Moliere has made on Terence +is the reservation of the discovery to the end; but the double +discovery is improbable. The introduction of Hyacinthe and +Zerbinette on the stage, is just as unsuccessful as the attempt +of Baron to present us, in his <hi rend="italic">Andrienne</hi>, with a lady corresponding +to Glycerium. Moliere’s Hyacinthe is quite insipid +<pb n="201"/><anchor id="Pg201"/>and uninteresting, while Zerbinette retains too much of the +Egyptian, and is too much delighted with the cheats of Scapin, +to become the wife of an honest man. +</p> + +<p> +From the above sketches some idea may have been formed +of Terence’s plots, most of which were taken from the Greek +stage, on which he knew they had already pleased. He has +given proofs, however, of his taste and judgment, in the additions +and alterations made on those borrowed subjects; and +I doubt not, had he lived an age later, when all the arts were +in full glory at Rome, and the empire at its height of power +and splendour, he would have found domestic subjects sufficient +to supply his scene with interest and variety, and would no +longer have accounted it a greater merit—<q>Græcas transferre +quam proprias scribere.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Terence was a more rigid observer than his Roman predecessors +of the unities of time and place. Whatever difference +of opinion may be entertained with regard to the preservation +of these unities in tragedy, since great results are often slowly +prepared, and in various quarters, there can be no doubt that +they are <anchor id="corr201"/><corr sic="appropiate">appropriate</corr> in comedy, which, moving in a domestic +circle, and having no occasion to wander, like the tragic or +epic muse, through distant regions, should bring its intrigue +to a rapid conclusion. Terence, however, would have done +better not to have adhered so strictly to unity of place, and to +have allowed the scene to change at least from the street or +portico in front of a house, to the interior of the dwelling. +From his apparently regarding even this slight change as +inadmissible, the most sprightly and interesting parts of the +action are often either absurdly represented as passing on the +street, though of a nature which must have been transacted +within doors, or are altogether excluded. A striking example +of the latter occurs in the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>, where the discovery of +Chærea by his father in the eunuch’s garb has been related, +instead of being represented. Plautus, who was of bolder +genius, varies the place of action, when the variation suits +his great purpose of merriment and jest. +</p> + +<p> +But though Terence has perhaps too rigidly observed the +unities of time and place, in none of his dramas, with a single +exception, has that of plot been adhered to. The simplicity +and exact unity of fable in the Greek comedies would have +been insipid to a people not thoroughly instructed in the +genuine beauties of the drama. Such plays were of too thin +contexture to satisfy the somewhat gross and lumpish taste of +a Roman audience. The Latin poets, therefore, bethought +themselves of combining two stories into one, and this junction, +which we call the double plot, by affording the oppor<pb n="202"/><anchor id="Pg202"/>tunity of more incidents, and a greater variety of action, best +contributed to the gratification of those whom they had to +please. But of all the Latin comedians, Terence appears to +have practised this art the most assiduously. Plautus has +very frequently single plots, which he was enabled to support +by the force of drollery. Terence, whose genius lay another +way, or whose taste was abhorrent from all sort of buffoonery, +had recourse to the other expedient of double plots; and this, +I suppose, is what gained him the popular reputation of being +the most artful writer for the stage. The <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi> is the only +one of his comedies of the true ancient cast, and we know +how unsuccessful it was in the representation<note place="foot">Hurd’s <hi rend="italic">Horace</hi>, Vol. II.</note>. In managing +a double plot, the great difficulty is, whether also to divide +the interest. One thing, however, is clear, that the part which +is episodical, and has least interest, should be unravelled first; +for if the principal interest be exhausted, the subsidiary intrigue +drags on heavily. The <hi rend="italic">Andrian</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Self Tormentor</hi>, and +<hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi>, are all faulty in this respect. On the whole, however, +the plots of Terence are, in most respects, judiciously +laid: The incidents are selected with taste, connected with +inimitable art, and painted with exquisite grace and beauty. +</p> + +<p> +Next to the management of the plot, the characters and +manners represented are the most important points in a comedy; +and in these Terence was considered by the ancients as +surpassing all their comic poets.—<q>In argumentis,</q> says +Varro, <q>Cæcilius palmam poscit, in ethesi Terentius.</q> In +this department of his art he shows that comprehensive knowledge +of the humours and inclinations of mankind, which +enabled him to delineate characters as well as manners, with +a genuine and apparently unstudied simplicity. All the inferior +passions which form the range of comedy are so nicely +observed, and accurately expressed, that we nowhere find a +truer or more lively representation of human nature. He +seems to have formed in his mind such a perfect idea both of +his high and low characters, that they never for a moment +forget their age or situation, whether they are to speak in +the easy indifferent tone of polished society, or with the natural +expression of passion. Nor do his paintings of character +consist merely of a single happy stroke unexpectedly introduced: +His delineations are always in the right place, and so +harmonize with the whole, that every word is just what the +person might be supposed to say under the circumstances in +which he is placed:— +</p> + +<pb n="203"/><anchor id="Pg203"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Contemplez de quel air un pere dans Terence,</q></l> +<l>Vient d’un fils amoureux gourmander l’imprudence;</l> +<l>De quel air cet amant ecoute ses leçons,</l> +<l>Et court chez sa maitresse oublier ces chansons:</l> +<l>Ce n’est pas un portrait, un image semblable;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">C’est un amant, un fils, un pere veritable<note place="foot">Boileau.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The characters, too, of Terence are never overstrained by +ridicule, which, if too much affected, produces creatures of +the fancy, which for a while may be more diverting than portraits +drawn from nature, but can never be so permanently +pleasing. This constitutes the great difference between Plautus +and Terence, as also between the new and old comedy of +the Greeks. The old comedy presented scenes of uninterrupted +gaiety and raillery and ridicule, and nothing was +spared which could become the object of sarcasm. The dramatic +school which succeeded it attracted applause by beauty +of situation and moral sentiment. In like manner, Terence +makes us almost serious by the interest and affection which +he excites for his characters. In the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> we are touched +with all Pamphilus’ concern, we feel all his reflections to be +just, and pity his perplexity. The characters of Terence, +indeed, are of the same description with those of Plautus; but +his slaves and parasites and captains are not so farcical, nor +his panders and courtezans so coarse, as those of his predecessor. +The slave-dealers in the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi> are +rather merchants greedy of gain than shameless agents of +vice, and are not very different from Madame La Ressource, +in Regnard’s elegant comedy, <hi rend="italic">Le Joueur</hi>. His courtezans, +instead of being invariably wicked and rapacious, are often +represented as good and beneficent. It was a courtezan who +received the dying mother of the Andrian, and, while expiring +herself, affectionately intrusted the orphan to the generous +protection of Pamphilus. It is a courtezan who, in the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi>, +discovers the family of the young Pamphila, and, in the +<hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>, brings about the understanding essential to the happiness +of all. From their mode of life, and not interposing +much beyond their domestic circle, the manners of modest +women were not generally painted with any great taste by +the ancients; but Terence may perhaps be considered as an +exception. Nausistrata is an excellent picture of a matron not +of the highest rank or dignity, as is also Sostrata in the <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +The style of wit and humour must of course correspond with +that of the characters and manners. Accordingly, the plays +of Terence are not much calculated to excite ludicrous emotions, +and have been regarded as deficient in comic force. +<pb n="204"/><anchor id="Pg204"/>His muse is of the most perfect and elegant proportions, but +she fails in animation, and spirit. It was for this want of the +<hi rend="italic">vis comica</hi> that Terence was upbraided by Julius Cæsar, in +lines which, in other respects, bear a just tribute of applause +to this elegant dramatist:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Tu quoque tu in summis, O dimidiate Menander,</q></l> +<l>Poneris, et merito, puri sermonis amator:</l> +<l>Lenibus atque utinam scriptis adjuncta foret vis</l> +<l>Comica, ut æquato virtus polleret honore</l> +<l>Cum Græcis, neque in hac despectus parte jaceres.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Unum hoc maceror, et doleo tibi deesse, Terenti.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +From the prologue to the <hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi> we learn that a clamour +had also been raised by his contemporaries against Terence, +because his dialogue was insipid, and wanted that comic +heightening which the taste of the age required:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 9"><q rend="post: none">Quas fecit fabulas,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Tenui esse oratione et scriptura levi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The plays of Terence, it must be admitted, are not calculated +to excite immoderate laughter, but his pleasantries are brightened +by all the charms of chaste and happy expression—thus +resembling in some measure the humour with which we are +so much delighted in the page of Addison, and which pleases +the more in proportion as it is studied and contemplated. +There are some parts of the <hi rend="italic">Eunuchus</hi> which I think cannot +be considered as altogether deficient in the <hi rend="italic">vis comica</hi>, as also +Demea’s climax of disasters in the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, and a scene in +the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>, founded on the misconceptions of Mysis. +</p> + +<p> +The beauties of style and language, I suppose, must be +considered as but secondary excellences in the drama. Were +they primary merits, Terence would deserve to be placed at +the head of all comic poets who have written for the stage, +on account of the consummate elegance and purity of his +diction. It is a singular circumstance, and without example +in the literary history of any other country, that the language +should have received its highest perfection, in point of elegance +and grace, combined with the most perfect simplicity, +from the pen of a foreigner and a slave. But it so happened, that +the countryman of Hannibal, and the freedman of Terentius +Lucanus, gave to the Roman tongue all those beauties, in a +degree which the courtiers of the Augustan age itself did not +surpass. Nor can this excellence be altogether accounted +for by his intimacy with Scipio and Lælius, in whose families +the Latin language was spoken with hereditary purity, since +it could only have been the merit of his dramas which first +<pb n="205"/><anchor id="Pg205"/>attracted their regard; and indeed, from an anecdote above +related, of what occurred while reading his <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> to a dramatic +censor, it is evident that this play must have been written +ere he enjoyed the sunshine of patrician patronage. For +this <hi rend="italic">Ineffabilis amœnitas</hi>, as it is called by Heinsius, he was +equally admired by his own contemporaries and by the writers +in the golden period of Roman literature. He is called by +Cæsar <hi rend="italic">puri sermonis amator</hi>, and Cicero characterizes him +as— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quicquid come loquens, ac omnia dulcia dicens.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Even in the last age of Latin poetry, and when his pure simplicity +was so different from the style affected by the writers +of the day, he continued to be regarded as the model of correct +composition. Ausonius, in his beautiful poem addressed +to his grandson, hails him on account of his style, as the ornament +of Latium— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Tu quoque qui Latium lecto sermone, Terenti,</q></l> +<l>Comis, et adstricto percurris pulpita socco,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ad nova vix memorem diverbia coge senectam<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Protrepticon. Eidyll.</hi> IV. v. 58.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Among all the Latin writers, indeed, from Ennius to Ausonius, +we meet with nothing so simple, so full of grace and +delicacy—in fine, nothing that can be compared to the comedies +of Terence for elegance of dialogue—presenting a constant +flow of easy, genteel, unaffected discourse, which never +subsides into vulgarity or grossness, and never rises higher +than the ordinary level of polite conversation. Of this, indeed, +he was so careful, that when he employed any sentence +which he had found in the tragic poets, he stripped it of that +air of grandeur and majesty, which rendered it unsuitable for +common life, and comedy. In reading the dialogue of Simo +in the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi>, and of Micio in the <hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, we almost think +we are listening to the conversation of Scipio Africanus, and +the <hi rend="italic">mitis sapientia Læli</hi>. The narratives, in particular, possess +a beautiful and picturesque simplicity. Cicero, in his +treatise <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, has bestowed prodigious applause on that +with which the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> commences. <q>The picture,</q> he observes, +<q>of the manners of Pamphilus—the death and funeral +of Chrysis—and the grief of her supposed sister, are all represented +in the most delightful colours.</q>—Diderot, speaking +of the style of Terence, says, <q>C’est une onde pure et transparente, +qui coule toujours egalement, et qui ne prend de +<pb n="206"/><anchor id="Pg206"/>vitesse, que ce qu’elle en reçoit de la pente et du terrein. +Point d’esprit, nul etalage de sentiment, aucune sentence qui +ait l’air epigrammatique, jamais de ces definitions qui ne seroient +placées que dans Nicole ou la Rochefoucauld.</q> +</p> + +<p> +As to what may be strictly called the poetical style of +Terence, it has been generally allowed that he has used very +great liberties in his versification<note place="foot">See Blankenburg’s <hi rend="italic">Zusätze zu Sulzer’s Theorie der Schönen Wissenschaften</hi>.</note>. Politian divided his plays +(which in the MSS. resemble prose) into lines, but a separation +was afterwards more correctly made by Erasmus. Priscian +says, that Terence used more licenses than any other writer. +Bentley, after Priscian, admitted every variety of Iambic and +Trochaic measure; and such was the apparent number of +irregular quantities, and mixture of different species of verse, +that Westerhovius declares, that in order to reduce the lines +to their original accuracy, it would be necessary to evoke +Lælius and Scipio from the shades. Mr Hawkins, in his late +Inquiry into the Nature of Greek and Latin poetry, has attempted +to show that the whole doctrine of poetical licenses +is contrary to reason and common sense; that no such deviation +from the laws of prosody could ever have been introduced +by Terence; and that where his verses apparently require +licenses, they are either corrupt and ill-regulated, or may be +reduced to the proper standard, on the system of admitting +that all equivalent feet may come in room of the fundamental +feet or measures. On these principles, by changing the situation +of the quantities, by allowing that one long syllable may +stand for two short, or <hi rend="italic">vice versa</hi>, there will not be occasion +for a single poetical license, which is in fact nothing less than +a breach of the rules of prosody. +</p> + +<p> +After having considered the plays of Plautus and of Terence, +one is naturally led to institute a comparison between +these two celebrated dramatists. People, in general, are very +apt to judge of the talents of poets by the absolute merits of +their works, without at all taking into view the relative circumstances +of their age and situation, or the progress of improvement +during the period in which they lived. No one recollects +that Tasso’s <hi rend="italic">Rinaldo</hi> was composed in ten months, and +at the age of seventeen; and, in like manner, we are apt to forget +the difference between writing comedies while labouring at +a mill, and basking in the Alban villa of Scipio or Lælius. The +improvement, too, of the times, brought the works of Terence +to perfection and maturity, as much as his own genius. It is +evident, that he was chiefly desirous to recommend himself to +<pb n="207"/><anchor id="Pg207"/>the approbation of a select few, who were possessed of true +wit and judgment, and the dread of whose censure ever kept +him within the bounds of correct taste; while the sole object +of Plautus, on the other hand, was to excite the merriment of +an audience of little refinement. If, then, we merely consider +the intrinsic merit of their productions, without reference +to the circumstances or situation of the authors, still +Plautus will be accounted superior in that vivacity of action, +and variety of incident, which raise curiosity, and hurry on +the mind to the conclusion. We delight, on the contrary, to +linger on every scene, almost on every sentence, of Terence. +Sometimes there are chasms in Plautus’s fables, and the incidents +do not properly adhere—in Terence, all the links of the +action depend on each other. Plautus has more variety in his +exhibition of characters and manners, but his pictures are often +overcharged, while those of Terence are never more highly +coloured than becomes the modesty of nature. Plautus’s +sentences have a peculiar smartness, which conveys the +thought with clearness, and strikes the imagination strongly, +so that the mind is excited to attention, and retains the idea +with pleasure; but they are often forced and affected, and of +a description little used in the commerce of the world; whereas +every word in Terence has direct relation to the business +of life, and the feelings of mankind. The language of Plautus +is more rich and luxuriant than that of Terence, but is far +from being so equal, uniform, and chaste. It is often stained +with vulgarity, and sometimes swells beyond the limits of +comic dialogue, while that of Terence is <hi rend="italic">puro simillimus +amni</hi>. The verses of Plautus are, as he himself calls them, +<hi rend="italic">numeri innumeri</hi>; and Hermann declares, that, at least as now +printed, <hi rend="italic">omni vitiorum genere abundant</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Element. Doct. Met.</hi> Lib. II. c. 14.</note>. Terence attends +more to elegance and delicacy in the expression of passion—Plautus +to comic expression. In fact, the great object of +Plautus seems to have been to excite laughter among the audience, +and in this object he completely succeeded; but for +its attainment he has sacrificed many graces and beauties of +the drama. There are two sorts of humour—one consisting +in words and action, the other in matter. Now, Terence +abounds chiefly in the last species, Plautus in the first; and the +pleasantries of the older dramatist, which were so often flat, +low, or extravagant, finally drew down the censure of Horace, +while his successor was extolled by that poetical critic as the +most consummate master of dramatic art. <q>In short,</q> says +Crusius, <q>Plautus is more gay, Terence more chaste—the first +<pb n="208"/><anchor id="Pg208"/>has more genius and fire, the latter more manners and solidity. +Plautus excels in low comedy and ridicule, Terence in +drawing just characters, and maintaining them to the last. +The plots of both are artful, but Terence’s are more apt to +languish, whilst Plautus’s spirit maintains the action with +vigour. His invention was greatest; Terence’s, art and management. +Plautus gives the stronger, Terence a more elegant +delight. Plautus appears the better comedian of the +two, as Terence the finer poet. The former has more compass +and variety, the latter more regularity and truth, in his +characters. Plautus shone most on the stage; Terence +pleases best in the closet. Men of refined taste would prefer +Terence; Plautus diverted both patrician and plebeian<note place="foot"><q>Plus est,</q> says Erasmus, <q>exacti judicii in unâ comœdiâ Terentianâ quam in +Plautinis omnibus,</q> (B. 28. Epist. 20.) Naugerius, in his fourth Epistle, has instituted +a comparison between Plautus and Terence, much to the advantage of the +latter, and has expressed himself in terms of strong indignation at the well-known +verses of Volcatius Sedigitus, assigning the second place among the Latin comic +poets to Plautus, and the sixth to Terence.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Some intimations of particular plays, both of Plautus and +Terence, have already been pointed out; but independently +of more obvious plagiarisms, these dramatists were the models +of all comic writers in the different nations of Europe, at the +first revival of the drama. Their works were the prototypes +of the regular Italian comedy, as it appeared in the plays +of Ariosto, Aretine, Ludovico Dolce, and Battista Porta. In +these, the captain and parasite are almost constantly introduced, +with addition of the <hi rend="italic">pedante</hi>, who is usually the pedagogue +of the young <hi rend="italic">innamorato</hi>. Such erudite plays were +the only printed dramas (though the <hi rend="italic">Commedie dell’ Arte</hi> +were acted for the amusement of the vulgar,) till the beginning +of the 17th century, when Flaminio Scala first <hi rend="italic">published</hi> +his <hi rend="italic">Commedie dell’ Arte</hi>. The old Latin plays were also the +models of the earliest dramas in Spain, previous to the introduction +of the comedy of intrigue, which was invented by +Lopez de Rueda, and perfected by Calderon. We find the +first traces of the Spanish drama in a close imitation of the +<hi rend="italic">Amphitryon</hi>, in 1515, by Villalobos, the physician of Charles +V., which was immediately succeeded by a version of Terence, +by Pedro de Abril, and translations of the Portuguese comedies +of Vasconcellos<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Hist. de la Litterature Espagnole</hi>, traduite de l’Allemand de Bouterweck. +Vol. I. p. 339. Ed. 1812.</note>, which were themselves written in the +manner of Plautus. There is likewise a good deal of the +spirit of Plautus and Terence in the old English comedy, particularly +in the characters. A panegyrist on Randolph’s +<hi rend="italic">Jealous Lovers</hi>, which was published in 1632, says, <q>that it +<pb n="209"/><anchor id="Pg209"/>should be conserved in some great library, that if through +chance or injury of time, Plautus and Terence should be lost, +their united merit might be recognized. For, in this play, +thou hast drawn the pander, the gull, the jealous lover, the +doating father, the shark, and the crust wife.</q> +</p> + +<p> +The consideration of the servile manner in which the dramatists, +as well as novelists, of one country, have copied from +their predecessors in another, may be adduced in some degree +as a proof of the old philosophical aphorism, <hi rend="italic">Nihil est in intellectu +quod non prius fuerit in sensu</hi>; and also of the incapacity +of the most active and fertile imagination, greatly to diversify +the common characters and incidents of life. One would +suppose, previous to examination, that the varieties, both of +character and situation, would be boundless; but on review, +we find a Plautus copying from the Greek comic writers, and, +in turn, even an Ariosto scarcely diverging from the track of +Plautus. When we see the same characters only in new +dresses, performing the same actions, and repeating the same +jests, we are tempted to exclaim, that everything is weary, +stale, flat, and unprofitable, and are taught a lesson of melancholy, +even from the Mask of Mirth. +</p> + +<p> +While Plautus, Cæcilius, Afranius, and Terence, raised the +comic drama to high perfection and celebrity, Pacuvius and +Attius attempted, with considerable success, the noblest subjects +of the Greek tragedies. +</p> +</div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Pacuvius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Pacuvius"/> +<head>PACUVIUS,</head> + +<p> +who was the nephew of Ennius<note place="foot">Plinius, <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XXXV. c. 4.</note>, by a sister of that poet, was +born at Brundusium, in the year 534. At Rome he became +intimately acquainted with Lælius, who, in Cicero’s treatise +<hi rend="italic">De Amicitiâ</hi>, calls Pacuvius his host and friend: He also enjoyed, +like Terence, the intimacy of Scipio Africanus; but he +did not profit so much as the comic writer by his acquaintance +with these illustrious Romans for the improvement of +his style. There is an idle story, that Pacuvius had three +wives, all of whom successively hanged themselves on the +same tree; and that lamenting this to Attius, who was married, +he begged for a slip of it to plant in his own garden<note place="foot">This story is told of a Sicilian by Cicero, (<hi rend="italic">De Orat.</hi> II.)</note>; +an anecdote which has been very seriously confuted by Annibal +di Leo, in his learned Memoir on Pacuvius. This poet +also employed himself in painting: he was one of the first of +<pb n="210"/><anchor id="Pg210"/>the Romans who attained any degree of eminence in that elegant +art, and particularly distinguished himself by the picture +which he executed for the temple of Hercules, in the <hi rend="italic">Forum +Boarium</hi><note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XXXV. c. 4.</note>. He published his last piece at the age of eighty<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 63.</note>; +after which, being oppressed with old age, and afflicted with +perpetual bodily illness, he retired, for the enjoyment of its +soft air and mild winters, to Tarentum<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. XIII. c. 2.</note>, where he died, having +nearly completed his ninetieth year<note place="foot">Hieron. <hi rend="italic">Chron.</hi> p. 39. ed. ut supra.</note>. An elegant epitaph, +supposed to have been written by himself, is quoted, with +much commendation, by Aulus Gellius, who calls it <hi rend="italic">verecundissimum +et purissimum</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. I. c. 24.</note>. It appears to have been inscribed +on a tombstone which stood by the side of a public road, +according to a custom of the Romans, who placed their monuments +near highways, that the spot where their remains were +deposited might attract observation, and the departed spirit +receive the valediction of passing travellers: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Adolescens, tametsi properas, hoc te saxum rogat,</q></l> +<l>Uti ad se aspicias; deinde, quod scriptum est, legas.</l> +<l>Hic sunt poetæ Marcei Pacuviei sita</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ossa. Hoc volebam nescius ne esses—Vale<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">O, youth! though haste should urge thee hence away,</q></l> +<l>To read this stone thy steps one moment stay:</l> +<l>That here Pacuvius’ bones are laid to tell</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">I wished, that thou might’st know it—Fare thee well.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +Dr Johnson has laid it down as the first rule in writing epitaphs, that the name of +the deceased should not be omitted; but it seems rather too much to occupy four +lines with nothing but this information. +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Though a few fragments of the tragedies of Pacuvius remain, +our opinion of his dramatic merits can be formed only +at second hand, from the observations of those critics who +wrote while his works were yet extant. Cicero, though he +blames his style, and characterizes him as a poet <hi rend="italic">male loquutus</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 74.</note>, +places him on the same level for tragedy as Ennius +for epic poetry, or Cæcilius for comedy; and he mentions, in +his treatise <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, that his verses were by many considered +as highly laboured and adorned.—<q>Omnes apud hunc +ornati elaboratique sunt versus.</q> It was in this laboured +polish of versification, and skill in the dramatic conduct of +the scene, that the excellence of Pacuvius chiefly consisted; +for so the lines of Horace have been usually interpreted, +<pb n="211"/><anchor id="Pg211"/>where, speaking of the public opinion entertained concerning +the different dramatic writers of Rome, he says,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ambigitur quoties uter utro sit prior: aufert</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Pacuvius docti famam senis, Attius alti.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And the same meaning must be affixed to the passage in +Quintilian,—<q>Virium tamen Attio plus tribuitur; Pacuvium +videri doctiorem, qui esse docti adfectant, volunt<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Inst. Orat.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1.</note>.</q> Most +other Latin critics, though on the whole they seem to prefer +Attius, allow Pacuvius to be the more correct writer. +</p> + +<p> +The names are still preserved of about 20 tragedies of Pacuvius—<hi rend="italic">Anchises</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Antiope</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Armorum Judicium</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Atalanta</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Chryses</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Hermione</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Iliona</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Medus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Niptra</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Orestes et Pylades</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Paulus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Peribœa</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Tantalus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Teucer</hi>, +<hi rend="italic">Thyestes</hi>. Of these the <hi rend="italic">Antiope</hi> was one of the most distinguished. +It was regarded by Cicero as a great national tragedy, +and an honour to the Roman name.—<q>Quis enim,</q> +says he, <q>tam inimicus pene nomini Romano est, qui Ennii +Medeam, aut Antiopam Pacuvii, spernat, aut rejiciat?</q> Persius, +however, ridicules a passage in this tragedy, where +Antiope talks of propping her melancholy heart with misfortunes, +by which she means, (I suppose,) that she fortunately +had so many griefs all around her heart, that it was well +bolstered up, and would not break or bend so easily as it +must have done, had it been supported by fewer distresses— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Sunt quos Pacuviusque et verrucosa moretur</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Antiope, ærumnis cor luctificabile fulta.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Armorum Judicium</hi> was translated from Æschylus. With +regard to the <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>, (Orestes Servus,) there has been a +good deal of discussion and difficulty. Nævius, Ennius, and +Attius, are all said to have written tragedies which bore the +title of <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>; but a late German writer has attempted, +at great length, to show that this is a misconception; and that +all the fragments, which have been classed with the remains +of these three dramatic poets, belong to the <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi> of +Pacuvius, who was in truth the only Latin poet who wrote a +tragedy with this appellation. What the tenor or subject of +the play, however, may have been, he admits is difficult to +determine, as the different passages, still extant, refer to very +different periods of the life of Orestes; which, I think, is rather +adverse to his idea, that all these fragments were written by +the same person, and belonged to the same tragedy, unless, +<pb n="212"/><anchor id="Pg212"/>indeed, Pacuvius had utterly set at defiance the observance of +the celebrated unities of the ancient drama. On the whole, +however, he agrees with Thomas Stanley, in his remarks on +the <hi rend="italic">Chœphoræ</hi> of Æschylus, that the subject of the <hi rend="italic">Chœphoræ</hi>, +which is the vengeance taken by Orestes on the murderers of +his father, is also that of the <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi> of Pacuvius<note place="foot">Eberhardt, <hi rend="italic">Zustand der + <anchor id="corr212"/><corr sic="Schönem">Schönen</corr> Wissenschaften, bei den Römern</hi>, p. 35 +&c. Ed. Altona, 1801.</note>. Some +of the fragments refer to this as an object not yet accomplished:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Utinam nunc maturescam ingenio, ut meum patrem</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ulcisci queam.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Hermione</hi> turned on the murder of Pyrrhus by Orestes +at the instigation of Hermione. Cicero, in his Treatise <hi rend="italic">De +Amicitia</hi>, mentions, in the person of Lælius, the repeated +acclamations which had recently echoed through the theatre +at the representation of the <hi rend="italic">new play</hi> of his friend Pacuvius, in +that scene where Pylades and Orestes are introduced before +the king, who, being ignorant which of them is Orestes, whom +he had predetermined should be put to death, each insists, in +order to save the life of his friend, that he himself is the real +person in question. Delrio alleges that the <hi rend="italic">new play</hi> here +alluded to by Cicero was the <hi rend="italic">Hermione</hi>; but that play, as well +as the <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>, related to much earlier events than the +friendly contest between Pylades and Orestes, which took +place at the court of Thoas, King of Tauris, and was the concluding +scene in the dramatic life of Orestes, being long +subsequent to the murder of his mother, his trial in presence +of the Argives, or absolution at Athens before the Areopagus. +Accordingly, Tiraboschi states positively that this <hi rend="italic">new play</hi> of +Pacuvius, which obtained so much applause, was his <hi rend="italic">Pylades +et Orestes</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Stor. dell. Litterat. Ital.</hi> Part III. Lib. II. c. 1. § 20.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +In the <hi rend="italic">Iliona</hi>, the scene where the shade of Polydorus, who +had been assassinated by the King of Thrace, appears to his +sister Iliona, was long the favourite of a Roman audience, +who seem to have indulged in the same partiality for such +spectacles as we still entertain for the goblins in <hi rend="italic">Hamlet</hi> and +<hi rend="italic">Macbeth</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +All the plays above mentioned were imitated or translated +by Pacuvius from the Greek. His <hi rend="italic">Paulus</hi>, however, was of +his own invention, and was the first Latin tragedy formed on +a Roman subject. Unfortunately there are only five lines of +it extant, and these do not enable us to ascertain, which Ro<pb n="213"/><anchor id="Pg213"/>man of the name of Paulus gave title to the tragedy. It was +probably either Paulus Æmilius, who fell at Cannæ, or his son, +whose story was a memorable instance of the instability of +human happiness, as he lost both his children at the moment +when he triumphed for his victory over Perseus of Macedon. +</p> + +<p> +From no one play of Pacuvius are there more than fifty lines +preserved, and these are generally very much detached. The +longest passages which we have in continuation are a fragment +concerning Fortune, in the <hi rend="italic">Hermione</hi>—the exclamations +of Ulysses, while writhing under the agony of a recent wound, +in the <hi rend="italic">Niptra</hi>, and the following fine description of a sea-storm +introduced in the <hi rend="italic">Dulorestes</hi>:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Interea, prope jam occidente sole, inhorrescit mare;</q></l> +<l>Tenebræ conduplicantur, noctisque et nimbûm occæcat nigror;</l> +<l>Flamma inter nubes coruscat, cœlum tonitru contremit,</l> +<l>Grando, mista imbri largifluo, subita turbine præcipitans cadit;</l> +<l>Undique omnes venti erumpunt, sævi existunt turbines,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Fervet æstu Pelagus.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Such lines, however, as these, it must be confessed, are +more appropriate in epic, or descriptive poetry, than in tragedy. +</p> + +<p> +It does not appear that the tragedies of Pacuvius had much +success or popularity in his own age. He was obliged to have +recourse for his subjects to foreign mythology and unknown +history. Iphigenia and Orestes were always more or less +strangers to a Roman audience, and the whole drama in +which these and similar personages figured, never attained +in Rome to a healthy and perfect existence. Comedy, on the +other hand, addressed itself to the feelings of all. There were +prodigal sons, avaricious fathers, and rapacious courtezans, in +Rome as well as in Greece<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Dum fallax servus, durus pater, improba lena</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 3"><q rend="pre: none">Vivent, dum meretrix blanda, Menandrus erit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left:10"> +<hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Ovid</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Amor.</hi> Lib. I. +</l> + </lg> + +</note>. But it requires a certain cultivation +of mind and tenderness of heart to enjoy the representation +of a regular tragedy. The plebeians thronged to the +theatre for the sake of merriment, and the patricians were still +too much occupied with the projects of their own ambition, +to weep over the woes of Antigone or Electra. +</p> + +<p> +Pacuvius, accordingly, had fewer imitators than Plautus. +Indeed, for a long period he had none of much note, except +</p> + <pb n="214"/><anchor id="Pg214"/> +</div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Attius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Attius"/> +<head>ATTIUS,</head> + +<p> +or Accius, as he is sometimes, but improperly, called, who +brought forward his first play when thirty years old, in the +same season in which Pacuvius, having reached the age of +eighty, gave his last to the public<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 63.</note>. Now, as Pacuvius would be +eighty in 614, Attius, according to this calculation, must have +been born in 584. It has been questioned, however, if he was +born so early, since Valerius Maximus relates a story of his +refusing to rise from his place on the entrance of Julius Cæsar +into the College of Poets, because in that place they did not +contest the prize of birth, but of learning<note place="foot">Lib. III. c. 7.</note>,—which disrespect, +if he came into the world in 584, he could not have survived +to offer to the dictator, Julius Cæsar, who was not born till 654. +This collector of anecdotes, however, may probably allude +either to some other poet of the name of Attius, or to some +other individual of the Julian family, than the Julius Cæsar +who subverted the liberties of his country. At all events it +is evident, that Attius lived to extreme old age. If born in +584, he must have been 63 years old at the birth of Cicero, +who came into the world in 647. Now, Cicero mentions not +only having seen him, but having heard from his own mouth +opinions concerning the eloquence of his friend D. Brutus, and +other speakers of his time<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 28.</note>. Supposing this conversation took +place even when Cicero was so young as seventeen, Attius +must have lived at least to the age of eighty. +</p> + +<p> +It is certain, that Attius had begun to write tragedies before +the death of Pacuvius. Aulus Gellius relates, as a well-known +anecdote, that Attius, while on his way to Asia, was detained, +for some time at Tarentum, whither Pacuvius had retired, and +was invited to pass a few days with the veteran poet. During +his stay he read to his host the tragedy of <hi rend="italic">Atreus</hi>, which was +one of his earliest productions. Pacuvius declared his verses +to be high sounding and lofty, but he remarked that they were +a little harsh, and wanted mellowness. Attius acknowledged +the truth of the observation, which he said gave him much +satisfaction; for that genius resembled apples, which when +produced hard and sour, grow mellow in maturity, while those +which are unseasonably soft do not become ripe, but rotten<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Att.</hi> Lib. XIII. c. 2.</note>. +His expectations, however, were scarcely fulfilled, and the +produce of his more advanced years was nearly as harsh as +what he had borne in youth. He seems, nevertheless, to have +<pb n="215"/><anchor id="Pg215"/>entertained at all times a good opinion of his own poetical +talents: for, though a person of diminutive size, he got a huge +statue of himself placed in a conspicuous niche in the Temple +of the Muses<note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XXXIV. c. 5.</note>. Nor does his vanity appear to have exceeded +the high esteem in which he was held by his countrymen. Such +was the respect paid to him, that a player was severely punished +for mentioning his name on the stage<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Rhetoric. ad Herennium</hi>, Lib. I. c. 14, and Lib. II. c. 13.</note>. Decius Brutus, +who was consul in 615, and was distinguished for his victories +in Spain, received him into the same degree of intimacy to +which Ennius had been admitted by the elder, and Terence +by the younger, Scipio Africanus: and such was his estimation +of the verses of this tragedian, that he inscribed them over the +entrance to a temple adorned by him with the spoils of enemies +whom he had conquered<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">pro Archia</hi>, c. 10. Valer. Maxim. Lib. VIII. c. 15.</note>. From the high opinion generally +entertained of the force and eloquence of his tragedies, +Attius was asked why he did not plead causes in the Forum; +to which he replied, that he made the characters in his tragedies +speak what he chose, but that, in the Forum, his adversaries +might say things he did not like, and which he could not +answer<note place="foot">Quintilian, <hi rend="italic">Inst. Orat.</hi> Lib. V. c. 13.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Horace, in the same line where he celebrates the dramatic +skill of Pacuvius, alludes to the loftiness of Attius,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 9">—— <q rend="post: none">Aufert</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Pacuvius docti famam senis—Attius alti;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +by which is probably meant sublimity both of sentiment and +expression. A somewhat similar quality is intended to be +expressed in the epithet applied to him by Ovid:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ennius arte carens, animosique Attius oris,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Casurum nullo tempore nomen habent.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It would appear from Ovid likewise, that he generally chose +atrocious subjects for the arguments of his tragedies:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nec liber indicium est animi, sed honesta voluptas,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Plurima mulcendis auribus apta ferens:</l> +<l>Attius esset atrox, conviva Terentius esset,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Essent pugnaces qui fera bella canunt<note place="foot">Ovid, <hi rend="italic">Trist.</hi> Lib. II.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +By advice of Pacuvius, Attius adopted such subjects as had +already been brought forward on the Athenian stage; and we +accordingly find that he has dramatized the well-known sto<pb n="216"/><anchor id="Pg216"/>ries of Andromache, Philoctetes, Antigone, &c. There are +larger fragments extant from these tragedies than from the +dramatic works of Ennius or Pacuvius. One of the longest +and finest passages is that in the <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, where a shepherd +discovering, from the top of a mountain, the vessel which +conveyed the Argonauts on their expedition, thus expresses +his wonder and admiration at an object he had never before +seen:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 7">—— <q rend="post: none">Tanta moles labitur</q></l> +<l>Fremebunda ex alto, ingenti sonitu et spiritu</l> +<l>Præ se undas volvit, vortices vi suscitat,</l> +<l>Ruit prolapsa, pelagus respergit, reflat:</l> +<l>Ita num interruptum credas nimbum volvier,</l> +<l>Num quod sublime ventis expulsum rapi</l> +<l>Saxum, aut procellis, vel globosos turbines</l> +<l>Existere ictos, undis concursantibus?</l> +<l>Num quas terrestres pontus strages conciet;</l> +<l>Aut forte Triton fuscinâ evertens specus,</l> +<l>Subter radices penitus undanti in freto</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Molem ex profundo saxeam ad cœlum vomit?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +With this early specimen of Latin verse, it may be agreeable +to compare a corresponding passage in one of our most ancient +English poets. A shepherd, in Spenser’s <hi rend="italic">Epilogue to +the Shepherd’s Calendar</hi>, thus describes his astonishment at +the sight of a ship:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">For as we stood there waiting on the strand,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Behold a huge great vessel to us came,</l> +<l>Dancing upon the waters back to land,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">As if it scorn’d the danger of the same.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> +<l>Yet was it but a wooden frame, and frail,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Glued together with some subtle matter:</l> +<l>Yet had it arms, and wings, and head, and tail,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">And life, to move itself upon the water.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> +<l>Strange thing! how bold and swift the monster was!</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">That neither cared for wind, nor hail, nor rain,</l> +<l>Nor swelling waves, but thorough them did pass</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">So proudly, that she made them roar <anchor id="corr216"/><corr sic="(quote missing)">again.</corr></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Among the shorter fragments of Attius we meet with many +scattered sentiments, which have been borrowed by subsequent +poets and moral writers. The expression, <q><anchor id="corr216a"/><corr sic="oderunt dum metuunt">oderint +dum metuant</corr>,</q> occurs in the <hi rend="italic">Atreus</hi>. Thus, too, in the <hi rend="italic">Armorum +Judicium</hi>,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nam trophæum ferre me a forti pulchrum est viro;</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Si autem et vincar, vinci a tali, nullum est probrum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +A line in the same play— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Virtuti sis par—dispar fortunis patris,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="217"/><anchor id="Pg217"/> + +<p> +has suggested to Virgil the affecting address— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Disce, puer, virtutem ex me, verumque laborem;</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Fortunam ex aliis: ——</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This play, which turns on the contest of Ajax and Ulysses for +the arms of Achilles, has also supplied a great deal to Ovid. +The tragic poet makes Ajax say— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quid est cur componere ausis mihi te, aut me tibi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In like manner, Ajax, in his speech in Ovid— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Agimus, prô Jupiter, inquit,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ante rates causam, et mecum confertur Ulysses!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There are two lines in the <hi rend="italic">Philoctetes</hi>, which present a fine +image of discomfort and desolation— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Contempla hanc sedem, in qua ego novem hiemes, saxo stratus, pertuli,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ubi horrifer aquilonis stridor gelidas molitur nives<note place="foot"> +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">This dwelling of nine winters’ grief behold,</q></l> +<l>Where stretch’d on rock my sad sojourn I hold.</l> +<l>Around the boisterous north-wind ceaseless blows.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">And, while it rages, drifts the gelid snows.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Most of the plays of Attius, as we have seen, were taken +from the Greek tragedians. Two of them, however, the +<hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi> and the <hi rend="italic">Decius</hi>, hinged on Roman subjects, and were +both probably written in compliment to the family of his +patron, Decius Brutus. The subject of the former was the +expulsion of the Tarquins: but the only passage of it extant, +is the dream of Tarquin, and its interpretation, which have +been preserved by Cicero in his work <hi rend="italic">De Divinatione</hi>. Tarquin’s +dream was, that he had been overthrown by a ram +which a shepherd had presented to him, and that while lying +wounded on his back, he had looked up to the sky, and observed +that the sun, having changed his course, was journeying +from west to east. The first part of this dream being +interpreted, was a warning, that he would be expelled from +his kingdom by one whom he accounted as stupid as a sheep; +and the solar phenomenon portended a popular change in the +government. The interpreter adds, that such strange dreams +could not have occurred without the purpose of some special +manifestation, but that no attention need be paid to those +which merely present to us the daily transactions of life— +</p> + +<pb n="218"/><anchor id="Pg218"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nam quæ in vitâ usurpant homines, cogitant, curant, vident,</q></l> +<l>Quæque agunt vigilantes, agitantque, ea si cui in somno accidunt.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Minus mirum est ——</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In his tragedies, indeed, Attius rather shows a contempt for +dreams, and prodigies, and the science of augury— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nihil credo auguribus qui aures verbis divitant</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Alienas, suas ut auro locupletent domos.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The argument of Attius’ other drama, founded on a Roman +subject, and belonging to the class called <hi rend="italic">Prætextatæ</hi>, was +the patriotic self-devotion of Publius Decius, who, when his +army could no longer sustain the onset of the foe, threw +himself into the thickest of the combat, and was despatched +by the darts of the enemy. There were at least two of the +family of Decii, a father and son, who had successively devoted +themselves in this manner—the former in a contest with +the Latins, the latter in a war with the Gauls, leagued to the +Etruscans, in the year of Rome 457. No doubt, however, +can exist, that it was the son who was the subject of the tragedy +of <hi rend="italic">Attius</hi>—in the first place, because he twice talks of +following the example of his father— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 20"><q rend="post: none">—— Patrio</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Exemplo dicabo me, atque animam devotabo hostibus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And again— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quibus rem summam et patriam nostram quondam adauctavit pater.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And, in the next place, he refers, in two different passages, to +the opposing host of the Gauls— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Gallei, voce canora ac fremitu,</q></l> +<l>Peragrant minitabiliter ——</l> +<l> * * * * *</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vim Gallicam obduc contra in acie.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Horace, as is well known, bestowed some commendation on +those dramatists who had chosen events of domestic history +as subjects for their tragedies— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nec minimum meruere decus, vestigia Græca</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ausi deserere, et celebrare domestica facta<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ars Poetica</hi>, v. 286.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Dramas taken from our own annals, excite a public interest, +and afford the best, as well as easiest opportunity of attract<pb n="219"/><anchor id="Pg219"/>ing the mind, by frequent reference to our manners, prejudices, +or customs. It may, at first view, seem strange, that +the Romans, who were a national people, and whose epics +were generally founded on events in their own history, should, +when they did make such frequent attempts at the composition +of tragedy, have so seldom selected their arguments +from the ancient annals or traditions of their country. These +traditions were, perhaps, not very fertile in pathetic or mournful +incident, but they afforded subjects rich, beyond all +others, in tragic energy and elevation; and even in the range +of female character, in which the ancient drama was most +defective, Lucretia and Virginia were victims as interesting +as Iphigenia or Alcestis. The tragic writers of modern times +have borrowed from these very sources many subjects of +a highly poetical nature, and admirably calculated for scenic +representation. The furious combat of the Horatii and +Curiatii, the stern patriotic firmness of Brutus, the internal +conflicts of Coriolanus, the tragic fate of Virginia, and the +magnanimous self-devotion of Regulus, have been dramatized +with success, in the different languages of modern Europe. +But those names, which to us sound so lofty, may, to the +natives, have been too familiar for the dignity essential to +tragedy. In Rome, besides the risk of offending great families, +the Roman subjects were of too recent a date to have +acquired that venerable cast, which the tragic muse demands, +and time alone can bestow. They were not at sufficient +distance to have dropped all those mean and disparaging +circumstances, which unavoidably adhere to recent events, and +in some measure sink the noblest modern transactions to the +level of ordinary life. This seems to have been strongly felt +by Sophocles and Euripides, who preferred the incidents connected +with the sieges of Troy and of Thebes, rendered +gigantic only by the mists of antiquity, to the real and almost +living glories of Marathon or Thermopylæ. But the Romans +had no families corresponding to the race of Atreus or Œdipus—they +had no princess endowed with the beauty of Helen—no +monarch invested with the dignity of Agamemnon—they +had, in short, no epic cycle on which to form tragedies, like +the Greeks, whose minds had been conciliated by Homer in +favour of Ajax and Ulysses<note place="foot">Torq. Baden, in a small tract, entitled <hi rend="italic">De Causis neglectæ apud Romanos +tragœdiæ</hi>, (Gœtting. 1790,) almost entirely attributes the deficiency of the Romans +in tragedy to their want of a set of heroes, who were poetically consecrated +by any epic productions, like those by which Homer had so highly elevated the +Grecian chiefs.</note>. <q>The most interesting subjects +of tragedies,</q> says Adam Smith<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Theory of Moral Sentiments</hi>, Part VI. c. 1.</note>, <q>are the misfortunes of +<pb n="220"/><anchor id="Pg220"/>virtuous and magnanimous kings and princes;</q> but the Roman +kings were a detested race, for whose rank and qualities +there was no admiration, and for whose misfortunes there could +be no sympathy. Accordingly, after some few and not very +successful attempts to dramatize national incidents, the Latin +tragic writers relapsed into their former practice, as appears +from the titles of all the tragedies which were brought out +from the time of Attius to that of Seneca. +</p> + +<p> +Hence it follows, that those remarks, which have been +repeated to satiety with regard to the subjects of the Greek +theatre, are likewise applicable to those of the Roman stage. +There would be the same dignified misfortune displayed in +nobler and imposing attitudes—the same observance of the +unities—the same dramatic phrensy, remorse, and love, proceeding +from the vengeance of the gods, and exhibited in the +fate of Ajax, Orestes, and Phædra—the same struggle against +that predominant destiny, which was exalted even above the +gods of Olympus, and by which the ill-fated race of Atreus +was agitated and pursued. The Latin, like the Greek tragedies, +must have excited something of the same feeling as the +Laocoon or Niobe in sculpture; and, indeed, the moral of a +large proportion of them seems to be comprised in the chorus +of Seneca’s <hi rend="italic">Œdipus</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Fatis agimur—cedite fatis:</q></l> +<l>Non solicitæ possunt curæ</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mutare rati stamina fusi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +M. Schlegel is of opinion, that had the Romans quitted the +practice of Greek translation, and composed original tragedies, +these would have been of a different cast and species +from the Greek productions, and would have been chiefly +expressive of profound religious sentiments.—<q>La tragedie +Grecque avoit montré l’homme libre, combattant contre la +destinée; la tragedie Romaine eut presenté a nos regards +l’homme soumis a la Divinité, et subjugué jusques dans ses +penchans les plus intimes, par cette puissance infinie qui +sanctifie les ames, qui les enchaine de ses liens, et qui brille +de toutes parts, a travers le voile de l’univers<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Cours de Litter. Dramat.</hi> Leçon. VIII.</note>.</q> His reasons +for supposing that this difference would have existed, are +founded on the difference in the mythological systems of the +two nations.—<q>L’ancienne croyance des Romains et les +usages qui s’y rapportoient, renfermoient un sens moral, serieux, +philosophique, divinatoire et symbolique, qui n’existoit +pas dans la religion des Grecs.</q> There can be no doubt, +<pb n="221"/><anchor id="Pg221"/>that the Romans were in public life, during the early periods +or their history, a devotedly religious people. Nothing of +moment was undertaken without being assured that the gods +approved, and would favour the enterprise. The utmost order +was observed in every step of religious performance. We see a +consul leaving his army, on suspicion of some irregularity, to +hold new auspices—an army inspired with sacred confidence +and ardour, after appeasing the wrath of the gods, by expiatory +lustrations—and a conqueror dedicating at his triumph the +temple vowed in the moment of danger. But notwithstanding +all this, it so happens, that a spirit of free-thinking is one of +the most striking characteristics of the oldest class of Latin +poets, particularly the tragedians, and in the fragments of +those very plays which were founded on Roman subjects, +there is everywhere expressed a bitter contempt for augury, +and for the <hi rend="italic">sens divinatoire et symbolique</hi>, which they evidently +considered as quackery: and the dramatists do not seem +to have much scrupled to declare that it was so, or the people +to testify approbation of such sentiments. Even the almost +impious lines of Ennius, that the gods take no concern in the +affairs of mortals, were received, as we learn from Cicero, +with vast applause.—<q>Noster Ennius, qui magno plausu +loquitur, assentiente populo—Ego Deûm genus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Divinat.</hi> Lib. II. c. 50.</note>,</q> &c. It is +probable, however, that a tragedy purely Roman would have +been written in a different spirit from a Greek drama, because +the manners of the two people had little resemblance, and +because the Roman passion for freedom, detestation of tyranny, +and feelings of patriotism, had strong shades of +distinction from those of Greece. The self-devotion of the +Decii and Curtius, was of a fiercer description than that of +Leonidas. It was the headlong contempt, rather than the +resolute sacrifice, of existence. +</p> + +<p> +It was probably, too, from a slavish imitation of the Greek +dramatists, that the Latin tragedies acquired what is considered +one of their chief faults—the introduction of aphorisms +and moral sentences, which were not confined to the chorus, +the proper receptacle for them, (it being the peculiar office +and character of the chorus to moralize,) but were spread over +the whole drama in such a manner, that the characters appeared +to be <hi rend="italic">vivendi preceptores</hi> rather than <hi rend="italic">rei actores</hi>. +Quintilian characterizes Attius and Pacuvius as chiefly remarkable +for this practice.—<q>Tragœdiæ scriptores Attius et +Pacuvius, clarissimi gravitate sententiarum.</q> A question on +this point is started by Hurd,—That since the Greek trage<pb n="222"/><anchor id="Pg222"/>dians moralized so much, how shall we defend Sophocles, and +particularly Euripides, if we condemn Attius and Seneca? +Brumoy’s solution is, that the moral and political aphorisms +of the Greek stage generally contained some apt and interesting +allusion to the state of public affairs, easily caught by a +quick intelligent audience, and not a dry affected moral without +farther meaning, like most of the Latin maxims. In the +age, too, of the Greek tragedians, there was a prevailing fondness +for moral wisdom; and schools of philosophy were resorted +to for recreation as well as for instruction. Moral aphorisms, +therefore, were not inconsistent with the ordinary flow +of conversation in those times, and would be relished by such +as indulged in philosophical conferences, whereas such speculations +were not introduced till late in Rome, and were never +very generally in vogue. +</p> + +<p> +On the whole, it may be admitted that the bold and animated +genius of Rome was well suited to tragedy, and that in +force of colouring and tragic elevation the Latin poets presented +not a feeble image of their great originals; but unfortunately +their judgment was uninformed, and they were too +easily satisfied with their own productions. Strength and fire +were all at which they aimed, and with this praise they remained +contented. They were careless with regard to the +regularity or harmony of versification. The discipline of correction, +the curious polishing of art, which had given such +lustre to the Greek tragedies, they could not bestow, or held +the emendation requisite for dramatic perfection as disgraceful +to the high spirit and energy of Roman genius<note place="foot">Hurd’s <hi rend="italic">Horace</hi>, Vol. II.</note>: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Turpem putat inscriptis metuitque lituram<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. Ep. 1. v. 67.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +To originality or invention in their subjects, they hardly ever +presumed to aspire, and were satisfied with gathering what +they found already produced by another soil in full and ripened +maturity. +</p> + +<p> +It may perhaps appear strange that the Romans possessed +so little original talents for tragedy, and indeed for the drama +in general; but the genius of neighbouring nations, who had +equal success in other sorts of poetry, has often been very different +in this department of literature. The Spaniards could +boast of Lopez de Vega, Cervantes, and Calderon, at a time +when the Portuguese had no drama, and were contented with +the exhibitions of strolling players from Castile. Scotland +<pb n="223"/><anchor id="Pg223"/>had scarcely produced a single play of merit in the brightest +age of the dramatic glory of England—the age of Shakspeare, +Massinger, and Jonson. While France was delighted with +the productions of Racine, Corneille, and Moliere, the modern +Italians, as if their ancestors’ poverty of dramatic genius still +adhered to them, though so rich and abundant in every other +department of literature, scarcely possessed a tolerable play +of their own invention, and till the time of Goldoni were +amused only with the most slavish imitations of the Latin +comedies, the buffooneries of harlequin, or tragedies of accumulated +and unmitigated horrors, which excite neither the +interest of terror nor of pity. +</p> + +<p> +For all this it may not be easy completely to account; but +various causes may be assigned for the want of originality in +Roman tragedy, and indeed in the whole Roman drama. The +nation was deficient in that milder humanity of which there are +so many beautiful instances in Grecian history. From the +austere patriotism of Brutus sacrificing every personal feeling +to the love of country,—from the frugality of Cincinnatus, and +parsimony of the Censor, it fell with frightful rapidity into a +state of luxury and corruption without example. Even during +the short period which might be called the age of refinement, +it wanted a poetical public. To judge by the early part of +their history, one would suppose that the Romans were not +deficient in that species of sensibility which fits for due sympathy +in theatrical incidents. Most of their great revolutions +were occasioned by events acting strongly and suddenly on +their feelings. The hard fate of Lucretia, Virginia, and the +youth Publilius, freed them from the tyranny of their kings, +decemvirs, and patrician creditors. On the whole, however, +they were an austere, stately, and formal people; their whole +mode of life tended to harden the heart and feelings, and there +was a rigid uniformity in their early manners, ill adapted to +the free workings of the passions. External indications of +tenderness were repressed as unbecoming of men whose souls +were fixed on the attainment of the most lofty objects. Pity +was never to be felt by a Roman, but when it came in the shape +of clemency towards a vanquished foe, and tears were never +to dim the eyes of those whose chief pride consisted in acting +with energy and enduring with firmness. This self-command, +which their principles required of them,—this control of +every manifestation of suffering in themselves, and contempt +for the expression of it in others, tended to exclude tragedy +almost entirely from the range of their literature. +</p> + +<p> +Any softer emotions, too, which the Roman people may have +once experienced—any sentiments capable of being awakened +<pb n="224"/><anchor id="Pg224"/>to tragic pathos, became gradually blunted by the manner in +which they were exercised. They had, by degrees, been +accustomed to take a barbarous delight in the most wanton +displays of human violence, and brutal cruelty. Lions and +elephants tore each other in pieces before their eyes; and they +beheld, with emotions only of delight, crowds of hireling +gladiators wasting their energy, valour, and life, on the guilty +<hi rend="italic">arena</hi> of a Circus. Gladiatorial combats were first exhibited +by Decius and Marcus Brutus, at the funeral of their father, +about the commencement of the Punic wars. The number of +such entertainments increased with the luxury of the times; +and those who courted popular favour found no readier way +to gain it than by magnificence and novelty in this species of +expense. Cæsar exhibited three hundred pairs of gladiators; +Pompey presented to the multitude six hundred lions, to be +torn in pieces in the Circus, besides harnessed bears and +dancing elephants; and some other candidate for popular +favour, introduced the yet more refined barbarity of combats +between men and wild animals. These were the darling +amusements of all, and chief occupations of many Romans; +and those who could take pleasure in such spectacles, must +have lost all that tenderness of inward feeling, and all that +exquisite sympathy for suffering, without which none can +perceive the force and beauty of a tragic drama. The extension, +too, of the military power, and the increasing wealth +and splendour of the Roman republic, accustomed its citizens +to triumphal and gaudy processions. This led to a taste for +what, in modern times, has been called <hi rend="italic">Spectacle</hi>; and, instead +of melting with tenderness at the woes of Andromache, the +people demanded on the stage such exhibitions as presented +them with an image of their favourite pastimes:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quatuor aut plures aulæa premuntur in horas,</q></l> +<l>Dum fugiunt equitum turmæ, peditumque catervæ:</l> +<l>Mox trahitur manibus regum fortuna retortis;</l> +<l>Esseda festinant, pilenta, petorrita, naves:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Captivum portatur ebur, captiva Corinthus<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. ep. 1.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This sort of show was not confined to the afterpiece or entertainment, +but was introduced in the finest tragedies, which +were represented with such pomp and ostentation as to destroy +all the grace of the performance. A thousand mules +pranced about the stage in the tragedy of <hi rend="italic">Clytemnestra</hi>; and +whole regiments, accoutred in foreign armour, were marshalled +<pb n="225"/><anchor id="Pg225"/>in that of the <hi rend="italic">Trojan Horse</hi><note place="foot">Cicero.—<hi rend="italic">Epistolæ familiares</hi>, Lib. VII. ep. 1. Ed. Schütz.</note>. This taste, so fatal to the +genuine excellence of tragedy or comedy, was fostered and +encouraged by the Ædiles, who had the charge of the public +Shows, and, among others, of the exhibitions at the theatre. +The ædileship was considered as one of the steps to the +higher honours of the state; and those who held it could not +resort to surer means of conciliating the favour of their fellow-citizens, +or purchasing their future suffrages, than by sparing +no expense in the pageantry of theatrical amusements. +</p> + +<p> +The language, also, of the Romans, however excellent in +other respects, was at least in comparison with Greek, but ill +suited to the expression of earnest and vivid emotion. It required +an artful and elaborate collocation of words, and its +construction is more forced and artificial than that of most +other tongues. Hence passion always seemed to speak the +language with effort; the idiom would not yield to the rapid +transitions and imperfect phrases of impassioned dialogue. +</p> + +<p> +Little attention, besides, was paid to critical learning, and +the cultivation of correct composition. The Latin muse had +been nurtured amid the festivities of rural superstition; and +the impure mixture of licentious jollity had so corrupted her +nature, that it long partook of her rustic origin. Even so late +as the time of Horace, the tragic drama continued to be unsuccessful, +in consequence of the illiberal education of the +Roman youth; who, while the Greeks were taught to open all +the mind to glory, were so cramped in their genius by the +love of gain, and by the early infusion of sordid principles, +that they were unable to project a great design, or conduct +it to perfection. The consequence was, that the <q><hi rend="italic">ærugo et +cura peculi</hi></q> had so completely infected the Roman dramatists, +that lucre was the sole object of their pains. Hence, +provided they could catch popular applause, and secure a high +price from the magistrates who superintended theatrical exhibitions, +they felt indifferent to every nobler view, and more +worthy purpose:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Gestit enim nummum in loculos demittere; post hoc</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Securus, cadat, an recto stet fabula tale<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. 1.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But, above all, the low estimation in which the art of poetry +was held, must be regarded as a cause of its little progress +during the periods of the republic: <q>Sero igitur,</q> says Cicero, +<q>a nostris, poetæ vel cogniti vel recepti. Quo minus igitur +<pb n="226"/><anchor id="Pg226"/>honoris erat poetis, eo minora studia fuerunt<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tuscul. Disput.</hi> Lib. I, c. 2.</note>.</q> The earliest +poets of Rome had not the encouragement of that court favour +which was extended to Chaucer in England, to Marot and +Ronsard in France, and to Dante by the petty princes of Italy. +From Livius Andronicus to Terence, poetry was cultivated +only by foreigners and freedmen. Scipio and Lælius, indeed, +are said to have written some scenes in the plays of Terence; +but they did not choose that anything of this sort should pass +under their names. The stern republicans seem to have considered +poetry as an art which captives and slaves might cultivate, +for the amusement of their conquerors, or masters, but +which it would be unsuitable for a grave and lofty patrician +to practice. I suspect, the Romans regarded a poet as a tumbler +or rope-dancer, with whose feats we are entertained, but +whom we would not wish to imitate. +</p> + +<p> +The drama in Rome did not establish itself systematically, +and by degrees, as it did in Greece. Plautus wrote for the +stage during the time of Livius Andronicus, and Terence was +nearly contemporary with Pacuvius and Attius; so that everything +serious and comic, good and bad, came at once, and if +it was Grecian, found a welcome reception among the Romans. +On this account every species of dramatic amusement was indiscriminately +adopted at the theatre, and that which was most +absurd was often most admired. The Greek drama acquired +a splendid degree of perfection by a close imitation of nature; +but the Romans never attained such perfection, because, +however exquisite their models, they did not copy directly +from nature, but from its representative and image. +</p> + +<p> +Had the Romans, indeed, possessed a literature of their own, +when they first grew familiar with the works of the Greek +poets, their native productions would no doubt have been improved +by the study and imitation of the masterpieces of these +more accomplished foreigners; yet they would still have preserved +something of a national character. But, unfortunately, +when the Romans first became acquainted with the writings +of the Greeks, they had not even sown the seeds of learning, +so that they remained satisfied with the full-ripened produce +imported from abroad. Several critics have indeed remarked +in all the compositions of the Romans, and particularly in their +tragedies, a peculiar severity and loftiness of thought; but +they were all formed so entirely on a Greek model, that their +early poetry must be regarded rather as the production of art +than genius, and as a spark struck by contact and attrition, +<pb n="227"/><anchor id="Pg227"/>rather than a flame spontaneously kindled at the altar of the +Muses. +</p> + +<p> +In addition to all this, the Latin poet had no encouragement +to invent. He was not required to look abroad into +nature, or strike out a path for himself. So far from this +being demanded, Greek subjects were evidently preferred by +the public— +</p> + +<lg> + +<l><q rend="post: none">Omnes res gestas Athenis esse autumant,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quo vobis illud Græcum videatur magis<note place="foot">Plautus—<hi rend="italic">Menæchmi</hi>. Prolog.</note>.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +All the works, then, which have been hitherto mentioned, +and which, with exception of the <hi rend="italic">Annals</hi> of Ennius, are entirely +dramatic, belong strictly to what may be called the +Greek school of composition, and are unquestionably the least +original class of productions in the Latin, or perhaps any +other language. But however little the early dramatists of +Rome may have to boast of originality or invention, they are +amply entitled to claim an unborrowed praise for the genuine +purity of their native style and language. +</p> + +<p> +The style and language of the dramatic writers of the period, +on which we are now engaged, seem to have been much +relished by a numerous class of readers, from the age of Augustus +to that of the Antonines, and to have been equally +abhorred by the poets of that time. We have already seen +Horace’s indignation against those who admired the <hi rend="italic">Carmen +Saliare</hi>, or the poems of Livius, and which appears the bolder +and more surprising, as Augustus himself was not altogether +exempt from this predilection<note place="foot">Delectabatur veteri comœdia, et sæpe eam exhibuit publicis spectaculis. Suetonius, +<hi rend="italic">In August.</hi> c. 89.</note>; and we have also seen +the satire of Persius against his age, for being still delighted +with the fustian tragedies of Attius and the rugged style of +Pacuvius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Est nunc Brisei quem venosus liber Atti,</q></l> +<l>Sunt quos Pacuviusque et verrucosa moretur</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Antiope ærumnis cor luctificabile fulta.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In like manner Martial, in his Epigrams, mimicking the obsolete +phrases of the ancient dramatists— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none"><anchor id="corr227"/><corr sic="without quote">Attonitusque</corr> legis <hi rend="italic">terräi frugiferäi</hi>,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Attius et quicquid Pacuviusque vomunt.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Such sentiments, however, as is evident from Horace’s Epistle +<pb n="228"/><anchor id="Pg228"/>to Augustus, proceeded in a great measure from the modern +poets being provoked at an admiration, which they thought +did not originate in a real sense of the merit of these old +writers, but in an envious wish to depreciate, by odious comparison, +the productions of the day— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Jam Saliare Numæ carmen qui laudat, et illud</q></l> +<l>Quod mecum ignorat, solus vult scire videri;</l> +<l>Ingentis non ille favet, plauditque sepultis,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nostra sed impugnat—nos, nostraque lividus odit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But although a great proportion of the public may, with malicious +designs, have heaped extravagant commendations on +the style of the ancient tragedians, there can be no doubt +that it is full of vigour and richness; and if inferior to the +exquisite refinement of the Augustan age, it was certainly +much to be preferred to the obscurity of Persius, or the conceits +of Martial. <q>A very imperfect notion,</q> says Wakefield, +in one of his letters to Fox, <q>is entertained in general of the +copiousness of the Latin language, by those who confine +themselves to what are styled the Augustan writers. The +old comedians and tragedians, with Ennius and Lucilius, were +the great repositories of learned and vigorous expression. I +have ever regarded the loss of the old Roman poets, particularly +Ennius and Lucilius, from the light they would have +thrown on the formations of the Latin language, and its derivation +from the Æolian Greek, as the severest calamity ever +sustained by philological learning<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Correspondence</hi>, &c. p. 205. Lond. 1813.</note>.</q> Sometimes, indeed, their +words are uncouth, particularly their compound terms <anchor id="corr228"/><corr sic="and +and">and</corr> epithets, in the formation of which they are not nearly so +happy as the Greeks. Livius Andronicus uses <hi rend="italic">Odorisequos +canes</hi>—Pacuvius employs <hi rend="italic">Repandirostrum</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Incurvicervicum</hi>. +Such terms always appear incongruous and disjointed, +and not knit together so happily as <hi rend="italic">Cyclops</hi>, and other similar +words of the Greeks. +</p> + +<p> +The different classes into which the regular drama of this +period may be reduced, is a subject involved in great contradiction +and uncertainty, and has been much agitated in consequence +of Horace’s celebrated line— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Vel qui <hi rend="italic">Prætextas</hi> vel qui docuere <hi rend="italic">Togatas</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ars Poetica</hi>, v. 288.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +On the whole, it seems pretty evident, that the <hi rend="italic">regular</hi> drama +was divided into tragedy and comedy. A tragedy on a Greek +subject, and in which Greek manners were preserved, as the +<pb n="229"/><anchor id="Pg229"/>Hecuba, Dulorestes, &c. was simply styled <hi rend="italic">Tragœdia</hi>, or +sometimes <hi rend="italic">Tragœdia Palliata</hi>. Those tragedies again, in +which Roman characters were introduced, as the Decius and +Brutus of Attius, were called <hi rend="italic">Prætextatæ</hi>, because the Prætexta +was the habit worn by Roman kings and consuls. The +comedy which adopted Greek subjects and characters, like +those of Terence, was termed <hi rend="italic">Comœdia</hi>, or <hi rend="italic">Comœdia Palliata</hi>; +and that which was clothed in Roman habits and customs, +was called <hi rend="italic">Togata</hi><note place="foot">See Dubos, <hi rend="italic">Reflex. sur la Poésie</hi>. Jul. Pollux, <hi rend="italic">Onomasticon</hi>.</note>. Afranius was the most celebrated writer +of this last class of dramas, which were probably Greek +pieces accommodated to Roman manners, since Afranius lived +at a period when Roman literature was almost entirely imitative. +It is difficult, no doubt, to see how an Athenian comedy +could be bent to local usages foreign to its spirit and genius; +but the Latin writers were not probably very nice about the adjustment; +and the <hi rend="italic">Comœdia Togata</hi> is so slightly mentioned by +ancient writers, that we can hardly suppose that it comprehended +a great class of national compositions. The <hi rend="italic">Tabernaria</hi> was +a comedy of a lower order than the <hi rend="italic">Comœdia Togata</hi>: It +represented such manners as were likely to be met with among +the dregs of the Plebeians; and was so called from Taberna, +as its scene was usually laid in shops or taverns. These, I +think, are the usual divisions of the regular Roman drama; +but critics and commentators have sometimes applied the +term <hi rend="italic">Togata</hi> to all plays, whether tragedies or comedies, in +which Roman characters were represented, and <hi rend="italic">Palliata</hi> to +every drama of Greek origin. +</p> + +<p> +There was, however, a species of irregular dramas, for +which the Romans were not indebted to the Greeks, and +which was peculiar to themselves, called <hi rend="italic">Fabulæ Atellanæ</hi>. +These entertainments were so denominated from Atella, a +considerable town of the Oscans, now St Arpino, lying about +two miles south from Aversa, between Capua and Naples,—the +place now named Atella being at a little distance. +</p> + +<p> +When Livius Andronicus had succeeded in establishing at +Rome a regular theatre, which was formed on the Greek +model, and was supported by professional writers, and professional +actors, the free Roman youth, who were still willing, +amid their foreign refinements, occasionally to revive the +recollection of the old popular pastimes of their Italian ancestry, +continued to amuse themselves with the satiric pieces +introduced by the <hi rend="italic">Histrions</hi> of Etruria, and with the Atellane +Fables which Oscan performers had first made known at +<pb n="230"/><anchor id="Pg230"/>Rome<note place="foot">Livy, Lib. VII. c. 2.</note>. The actors of the regular drama were not permitted +to appear in such representations; and the Roman youths, to +whom the privilege was reserved, were not, as other actors, +removed from their tribe, or rendered incapable of military +service<note place="foot">Ibid.</note>; nor could they be called on like them to unmask +in presence of the spectators<note place="foot">Jul. Pollux, <hi rend="italic">Onomasticon</hi>. Festus ap. <hi rend="italic">Vossius de Poet. Lat.</hi> Lib. II. c. +35, § 8.</note>. It has been conjectured, that +the popularity of these spectacles, and the privileges reserved +to those who appeared in them, were granted in consequence +of their pleasantries being so tempered by the ancient Italian +gravity, that there was no admixture of obscenity or indecorum, +and hence no stain of dishonour was supposed to be +inflicted on the performers<note place="foot">Casaubon, <hi rend="italic">de Satyrica Poes.</hi> Lib. II. c. 1. Signorelli, <hi rend="italic">Stor. de Teat.</hi> Tom. +II. p. 14. This, however, is not very likely. The deference was probably paid, +because young patricians chose to act in the Atellanes: It could not otherwise have +been thought more creditable to personate the clown or fool of a semi-barbarous +race, than to perform the parts of Œdipus and Agamemnon.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The Atellane Fables consisted of detached scenes following +each other, without much dramatic connection, but replete +with jocularity and buffoonery. They were written in the +Oscan dialect, in the same way as the Venetian or Neapolitan +jargons are frequently employed in the Italian comedies; and +they differed from the Greek satiric drama in this, that the +characters of the latter were Satyrs, while those of the Atellane +fables were Oscan<note place="foot">Diomed. de <hi rend="italic">Poem. Gen.</hi> Lib. III.</note>. One of these was called Maccus, +a grotesque and fantastic personage, with an immense head, +long nose, and hump back, who corresponded in some measure +to the clown or fool of modern pantomime, and whose appellation +of Maccus has been interpreted by Lipsius as <hi rend="italic">Bardus</hi>, + <hi rend="italic">fatuus</hi>, <hi rend="italic">stolidus</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist. Quæst.</hi> Lib. XI. <hi rend="italic">Quæst.</hi> 22.</note>. In its rude but genuine form this species of +entertainment was in great vogue and constant use at Rome. +It does not appear that the Atellane fables were originally +written out, or that the actors had certain parts prescribed +to them. The general subject was probably agreed on, but +the performers themselves filled up the scenes from their own +art or invention<note place="foot">Du Bos, <hi rend="italic">Reflex. Critiques</hi>, Tom. I. p. 154.</note>. As the Roman language improved, and +the provincial tongues of ancient Italy became less known, +the Oscan dialect was gradually abandoned. Quintus Novius, +who lived in the beginning of the seventh century of Rome, +and whom Macrobius mentions as one of the most approved +writers of Atellane Fables, was the author who chiefly con<pb n="231"/><anchor id="Pg231"/>tributed to this innovation. He is cited as the author of the +<hi rend="italic">Virgo Prægnans</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Dotata</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Gallinaria</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Gemini</hi>, and various +others. +</p> + +<p> +At length, in the time of Sylla, Lucius Pomponius produced +Atellane Fables, which were written without any intermixture +of the Oscan dialect, being entirely in the Latin +language; and he at the same time refined their ancient buffoonery +so much, by giving them a more rational cast, that +he is called by Velleius Paterculus the inventor of this species +of drama, and is characterized by that author as <q>sensibus +celebrem, verbis rudem<note place="foot">Lib. II. c. 9.</note>.</q> Pomponius was remarkable for +his accurate observation of manners, and his genius has been +highly extolled by Cicero and Seneca. The names of sixty-three +of his pieces have been cited by grammarians, and from +all these fragments are still extant. From some of them, +however, not more than a line has been preserved, and from +none of them more than a dozen. It would appear that the +Oscan character of Maccus was still retained in many fables +of Pomponius, as there is one entitled <hi rend="italic">Maccus</hi>, and others +<hi rend="italic">Macci Gemini</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Maccus Miles</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Maccus Sequestris</hi>, in the +same manner as we say Harlequin footman, &c. Pappo, or +Pappus, seems also to have been a character introduced along +with Maccus, and, I should think, corresponded to the Pantaloon +of modern pantomime. Among the names of the Atellanes +of Pomponius we find <hi rend="italic">Pappus Agricola</hi>, and among +those of Novius, <hi rend="italic">Pappus Præteritus</hi>. This character, however, +appears rather to have been of Greek than of Oscan +origin; and was probably derived from <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Παππος</foreign><!--[Greek: Pappos]-->, the Silenus +or old man of the Greek dramatic satire. +</p> + +<p> +The improvements of Pomponius were so well received at +Rome, that he was imitated by Mummius, and by Sylla himself, +who, we are told by Athenæus, wrote several Atellane +Fables in his native language<note place="foot">Lib. VI. c. 17.</note>. In this new form introduced +by Pomponius the Atellane dramas continued to enjoy great +popularity in Rome, till they were in some measure superseded +by the Mimes of Laberius and Publius Syrus. +</p> + +<p> +Along with the Atellane Fables, the Roman youth were in +the practice of acting short pieces called <hi rend="italic">Exodia</hi>, which were +interludes, or after-pieces, of a yet more loose, detached, and +farcical description, than the Atellanes, being a continuation +of the ancient performances originally introduced by the Histrions +of Etruria<note place="foot">Conferta fabellis potissimum Atellanis sunt. Livy, Lib. VII. + <anchor id="corr231"/><corr sic="c">c.</corr> 2.</note>. In these Exodia the actors usually wore +the same masks and habits as in the Atellanes and tragedies<note place="foot">Sulzer, <hi rend="italic">Theorie der Schönen <anchor id="corr231a"/><corr sic="Kunste">Künste</corr></hi>, Lib. I. p. 520.</note>, +<pb n="232"/><anchor id="Pg232"/>and represented the same characters in a ludicrous point of +view:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Urbicus Exodio risum movet Atellanæ</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Gestibus Autonoes. Hunc diligit Ælia pauper<note place="foot">Juvenal, <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> VI.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Joseph Scaliger, in his Commentary on Manilius, gives his +opinion, that the <hi rend="italic">Exodia</hi> were performed at the end of the +principal piece, like our farces, and were so called as being +the issue of the entertainment, which is also asserted by a +scholiast on Juvenal<note place="foot">Exodiarius apud veteres in fine ludorum intrabat, quod ridiculus foret, ut, quidquid +lachrymarum atque tristitiæ coegissent, ex tragicis affectibus, hujus spectaculi +risus detergeret.—<hi rend="italic">Ad Juvenal. Satir. III.</hi> v. 175.</note>. But the elder Scaliger and Salmasius +thought that the <hi rend="italic">exodium</hi> was a sort of interlude, and had not +necessarily any connection with the principal representation. +The <hi rend="italic">Exodia</hi> continued to be performed with much license in +the times of Tiberius and Nero; and when the serious spirit +of freedom had vanished from the empire, they often contained +jocular but direct allusions to the crimes of the portentous +monsters by whom it was scourged and afflicted. +</p> + +<p> +It has been much disputed among modern critics, whether +the +</p> +</div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Satire"/><index index="pdf" level1="Satire"/> +<head>SATIRE</head> + +<p> +of the Romans was derived from the Greeks, or was of their +own invention. The former opinion has been maintained by +the elder Scaliger<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Poetices Libri</hi>.</note>, Heinsius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Sat. Horat.</hi></note>, Vulpius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Sat. Latin.</hi></note>, and, among the +most recent German critics, by Blankenburg<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ad. Sulzer.</hi></note>, Conz, and +Flogel<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Geschichte der komischen Litteratur</hi>.</note>; the latter theory, which seems to have been that of +the Romans themselves, particularly of Horace and Quintilian<note place="foot">Satira tota nostra est.</note>, +has been supported by Diomedes<note place="foot">Lib. III.</note>, Joseph Scaliger, +Casaubon<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Satir. Poes.</hi></note>, Spanheim<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Dissertation sur les Cesars de Julien</hi>.</note>, Rigaltius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Sat. Juvenalis</hi>.</note>, Dacier<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Pref. sur les Sat. d’Horace</hi>.</note>, and Dryden, +and by Koenig<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Sat. Romanâ</hi>.</note>, and Manso, among the Germans. Those +who suppose that satire descended directly from the Greeks +to the Romans, derive the word from <hi rend="italic">Satyrus</hi>, the well-known +mythological compound of a man and goat. Casaubon, on +the other hand, and most of those who have followed him, +deduce it from the adjective <hi rend="italic">Satura</hi>, a Sabine word, originally +signifying a medley, and, afterwards,—full or abundant. To +<pb n="233"/><anchor id="Pg233"/>this word the substantive <hi rend="italic">Lanx</hi> was understood, which meant +the platter or charger whereon the first fruits of the earth +were offered to Bacchus at his festivals,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ergo rite suum Baccho dicemus honorem</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Carminibus patriis, lancesque et liba feremus<note place="foot">Virgil, <hi rend="italic">Georg.</hi> Lib. II.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The term <hi rend="italic">Satura</hi> thus came to be applied to a species of +composition, originally written in various sorts of verse, and +comprehending a <hi rend="italic">farrago</hi> of all subjects,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quicquid agunt homines, votum, timor, ira, voluptas,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Gaudia, discursus<note place="foot">Juvenal. <hi rend="italic">Satir.</hi> Lib. I. We shall afterwards see reason to conclude, that the +famous <hi rend="italic">Satira Menippea</hi> of Varro seems not to have been Satyra, but Satura, a +hodge-podge, or medley.</note>,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In the same way, laws were called <hi rend="italic">Leges Saturæ</hi>, when they +consisted of several heads and titles: and Verrius Flaccus calls +a dish, which I suppose was a sort of <hi rend="italic">olla podrida</hi>—Satura:—<q>Satura +cibi genus ex variis rebus conditum.</q> Dacier, however, +though he agrees with Casaubon as to the Latin origin +of satire, derives the term from Saturn; as he believes that it +was at festivals in honour of that ancient god of Italy that +those rustic impromptus, which gave rise to satire, were first +recited. +</p> + +<p> +Flogel, in his German <hi rend="italic">History of Comic Literature</hi>, attempts +to show, at considerable length, that Casaubon has attributed +too much to the derivation of the word satire; since, though +the term may be of Latin origin, it does not follow that the +thing was unknown to the Greeks,—and that he also relies +too much on the argument, that the satiric plays of the Greeks +were quite different from the satire of the Romans, which may +be true; while, at the same time, there are other sorts of +Greek compositions, as the lyric satires of Archilochus and the +<hi rend="italic">Silli</hi>, which have a much nearer resemblance to the Latin +didactic satire than any satirical drama. +</p> + +<p> +In fact, the whole question seems to depend on what constitutes +a sufficient alteration or variety from former compositions, +to give a claim to invention. Now it certainly cannot +be pretended, so far as we know, that <hi rend="italic">any</hi> satiric productions +of the Greeks had much resemblance to those of the Romans. +The Greek satires, which are improperly so termed, were +divided into what were called tragic and comic. The former +were dramatic compositions, which had their commencement, +like the regular tragedy, in rustic festivals to the honour of +<pb n="234"/><anchor id="Pg234"/>Bacchus; and in which, characters representing Satyrs, the +supposed companions of that god, were introduced, imitating +the coarse songs and fantastic dances of rural deities. In +their rude origin, it is probable that only one actor, equipped +as a Satyr, danced or sung. Soon, however, a chorus +appeared, consisting of the bearded and beardless Satyrs, +Silenus, and Pappo Silenus; and Histrions, representing heroic +characters, were afterwards introduced. The satiric drama +began to flourish when the regular tragedy had become too +refined to admit of a chorus, or accompaniment of Satyrs, but +while these were still remembered with a sort of fondness, +which rendered it natural to recur to the most ancient shape +of the drama. In this state of the progress of the Greek stage, +the satire was performed separately from the tragedy; and out +of respect to the original form of tragedy, was often exhibited +as a continuation or parody of the tragic <hi rend="italic">trilogy</hi>, or three +serious plays,—thus completing what was called the <hi rend="italic">tetralogia</hi>. +The scene of these satires was laid in the country, +amid woods, caves, and mountains, or other such places as +Satyrs were supposed to inhabit; and the subjects chosen +were those in which Satyrs might naturally be feigned to have +had a share or interest. High mythological stories and fabulous +heroes were introduced, as appears from the names +preserved by Casaubon, who mentions the <hi rend="italic">Hercules</hi> of Astydamas, +the <hi rend="italic">Alcmæon</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Vulcan</hi> of Achæus,—each of which +is denominated <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">σατυρικος</foreign><!--[Greek: satyrikos]-->. These heroic characters, however, +were generally parodied, and rendered fantastic, by the gross +railleries of Silenus and the Fauns. The <hi rend="italic">Cyclops</hi> of Euripides, +which turns on the story of Ulysses in the cave of +Polyphemus, is the only example entirely extant of this species +of composition. Some fragments, however, remain of the +<hi rend="italic">Lytiersa</hi> of Sositheus, an author who flourished about the +130th Olympiad, which was subsequent to the introduction of +the new Greek comedy. Lytiersa, who gives name to this +dramatic satire, lived in Phrygia. He used to receive many +guests, who flocked to his residence from all quarters. After +entertaining them at sumptuous banquets, he compelled them +to go out with him to his fields, to reap his crop or cut his +hay; and when they had performed this labour, he mowed off +their heads, with a scythe. The style of entertainment, it +seems, did not prevent his house from being a place of +fashionable resort. Hercules, however, put an end to this +mode of wishing a good afternoon, by strangling the hospitable +landlord, and throwing his body into the Mæander. It is +evident, from the subject of this play, and of the <hi rend="italic">Cyclops</hi>, that +the tragic satires were a sort of fee-fa-fum performance, like +<pb n="235"/><anchor id="Pg235"/>our after-pieces founded on the stories of <hi rend="italic">Blue Beard</hi> and +<hi rend="italic">Jack the Giant Killer</hi>. They were generally short and simple +in their plan: They contained no satire or ridicule against the +fellow-citizens of the author, or any private individuals whatever; +but there was a good deal of jeering by the characters +at each other, and much buffoonery, revelling, and indecency, +among the satiric persons of the chorus. +</p> + +<p> +The Comic Satire began later than the Tragic, subsisted +for some time along with it, and finally survived it. In Greece +it was chiefly popular after the time of Alexander, and it also +flourished in the court of the Egyptian Ptolemies. It was quite +different from the Tragic Satire; the action being laid in +cities, or at least not always amid rustic scenes. Private individuals +were often satirized in it, and not unfrequently the +tyrants or rulers of the state. When a mythic story was +adopted, the affairs of domestic life were conjoined with the +action, and it never was of the same enormous or bloody nature +as the fables employed in the tragic satire, but such subjects +were usually chosen as that of Amphitryon, Apollo feeding the +flocks of Admetus, &c. Satyrs were not essential characters, +and when they were introduced, private individuals were +generally intended to be ridiculed, under the form of these +rustic divinities. Gluttony, to judge from some fragments +preserved by Athenæus, was one of the chief topics of banter +and merriment. Timocles, who lived about the 114th Olympiad, +was the chief author of comic satires. Lycophron, better +known by his <hi rend="italic">Cassandra</hi>, also wrote one called <hi rend="italic">Menedemus</hi>, +in which the founder of the Eretric school of philosophy +was exposed to ridicule, under the character of Silenus, and +his pupils under the masks of Satyrs. +</p> + +<p> +Besides their dramatic satires, the Greeks had another species +of poem called <hi rend="italic">Silli</hi>, which were patched up like the +<hi rend="italic">Cento Nuptialis</hi> of Ausonius from the verses of serious writers, +and by such means turned to a different sense from what their +original author intended. Thus, in the <hi rend="italic">Silli</hi> attributed to +Timon, a sceptic philosopher and disciple of Pyrrho, who lived +in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus, the lines are copied from +Homer and the tragic poets, but they are satirically applied to +certain customs and systems of philosophy, which it was his +object to ridicule. Some specimens of the <hi rend="italic">Silli</hi> may be found +in Diogenes Laertius; but the longest now extant is a passage +preserved in Dio Chrysostom, exposing the mad attachment +of the inhabitants of Alexandria to chariot races. To these +<hi rend="italic">Silli</hi> may be added the lyric or iambic satires directed against +individuals, like those of Archilochus against Lycambes. +</p> + +<p> +The Roman didactic satire had no great resemblance to +<pb n="236"/><anchor id="Pg236"/>any of these sorts of Greek satire. It referred, as every one +knows, to the daily occurrences of life,—to the ordinary follies +and vices of mankind. With the Greek tragic satire it +had scarce any analogy whatever; for it was not in dialogue, +and contained no allusion to the mythological Satyrs who formed +the chorus of the Greek dramas. To the comic satire it +had more affinity; and those writers who have maintained the +Greek origin of Roman satire have done little justice to their +argument by not attending to the distinction between these +two sorts of dramatic satire, and treating the whole question +as if it depended on the resemblance to the tragic satire. In +the comic satire, as we have seen, Satyrs were not always nor +necessarily introduced. The subject was taken from ordinary +life; and domestic vice or absurdity was stigmatized and +ridiculed, as it was in the Roman satire, particularly during its +earliest ages. Still, however, there was no incident or plot +evolved in a Roman satire; nor was it written in dialogue, +except occasionally, for the sake of more lively sarcasm on +life and manners. +</p> + +<p> +But though the Roman satire took a different direction, it +had something of the same origin as the satiric drama of the +Greeks. As the Grecian holidays were celebrated with oblations +to Bacchus and Ceres, to whose bounty they owed their +wine and corn, in like manner the ancient Italians propitiated +their agricultural or rustic deities with appropriate offerings, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Tellurem porco—Sylvanum lacte piabant<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. ep. 1.</note><anchor id="corr236"/><corr sic=";">;</corr></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +but as they knew nothing of the Silenus, or Satyrs of the +Greeks, a chorus of peasants, fantastically disguised in masks +cut out from the barks of trees, danced or sung to a certain +kind of verse, which they called Saturnian:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nec non Ausonii, Trojâ gens missa, coloni</q></l> +<l>Versibus incomtis ludunt, risuque soluto;</l> +<l>Oraque corticibus sumunt horrenda cavatis:</l> +<l>Et te, Bacche, vocant per carmina læta, tibique</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Oscilla ex altâ suspendunt mollia pinu<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Georg.</hi> Lib. II. v. 385.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These festivals had usually the double purpose of worship +and recreation; and accordingly the verses often digressed +from the praises of Bacchus to mutual taunts and railleries, +like those in Virgil’s third eclogue, on the various defects and +vices of the speakers. +</p> + +<p> +Such rude lines, originally sung or recited in the Tuscan +and Latian villages, at nuptials or religious festivals, were first +<pb n="237"/><anchor id="Pg237"/>introduced at Rome by <hi rend="italic">Histrions</hi>, who, as already mentioned, +were summoned from Etruria, in order to allay the pestilence +which was depopulating the city. These Histrions being +mounted on a stage, like our mountebanks, performed a sort +of <hi rend="italic">ballet</hi>, by dancing and gesticulating to the sound of musical +instruments. The Roman youth thus learned to imitate their +gestures and music, which they accompanied with railing +verses delivered in extemporary dialogue. +</p> + +<p> +The jeering, however, which had been at first confined to +inoffensive raillery, at length exceeded the bounds of moderation, +and the peace of private families was invaded by the +unrestrained license of personal invective:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Libertasque recurrentes accepta per annos</q></l> +<l>Lusit amabiliter, donec jam sævus apertam</l> +<l>In rabiem cœpit verti jocus; et per honestas</l> +<l>Ire domos impune minax; doluere cruento</l> +<l>Dente lacessiti; fuit intactis quoque cura</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Conditione super communi<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. II. ep. 1.</note>.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This exposure of private individuals, which alarmed even those +who had been spared, was restrained by a salutary law of the +Decemvirs.—<q>Si quis occentassit malum carmen, sive condidisit, +quod infamiam faxit flagitiumve alteri, fuste ferito.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Ennius, perceiving how much the Romans had been delighted +with the rude satires poured forth in extemporary dialogue, +thought it might be worth his pains to compose satires +not to be recited but read. He preserved in them, however, +the groundwork of the ancient pleasantry, and the venom of +the ancient raillery, on individuals, as well as on general vices. +His satires related to various subjects, and were written in +different sorts of verses—hexameters being mingled with +iambic and trochaic lines, as fancy dictated. +</p> + +<p> +The satires of Ennius, which have already been more particularly +mentioned, were imitated by Pacuvius, and from his +time the word <hi rend="italic">satire</hi> came to be applied at Rome only to +poems containing either a playful or indignant censure on +manners. This sort of composition was chiefly indebted for +its improvement to +</p> +</div> + <div> + <pb n="238"/><anchor id="Pg238"/> + <index index="toc" level1="Lucilius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Lucilius"/> +<head>LUCILIUS,</head> + +<p> +A Roman knight, who was born in the year 605, at Suessa, a +town in the Auruncian territory. He was descended of a +good family, and was the maternal granduncle of Pompey the +Great. In early youth he served at the siege of Numantia, in +the same camp with Marius and Jugurtha, under the younger +Scipio Africanus<note place="foot">Velleius Paterc. <hi rend="italic">Histor.</hi> Lib. II. 9.</note>, whose friendship and protection he had the +good fortune to acquire. On his return to Rome from his +Spanish campaign, he dwelt in a house which had been built +at the public expense, and had been inhabited by Seleucus +Philopater, Prince of Syria, whilst he resided in his youth as an +hostage at Rome<note place="foot">Ascon. Pedianus in <hi rend="italic">Comment. in Orat. Ciceronis cont. L. Pisonem</hi>.</note>. Lucilius continued to live on terms of the +closest intimacy with the brave Scipio and wise Lælius, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quin ubi se a vulgo et scenâ in secreta remôrant</q></l> +<l>Virtus Scipiadæ et mitis sapientia Lælî,</l> +<l>Nugari cum illo et discincti ludere, donec</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Decoqueretur olus, soliti<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. II. 1. v. 71.</note>.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These powerful protectors enabled him to satirize the vicious +without restraint or fear of punishment. In his writings he +drew a genuine picture of himself, acknowledged his faults, +made a frank confession of his inclinations, gave an account of +his adventures, and, in short, exhibited a true and spirited +representation of his whole life. Fresh from business or pleasure, +he seized his pen while his fancy was yet warm, and his +passions still awake,—while elated with success or depressed +by disappointment. All these feelings, and the incidents +which occasioned them, he faithfully related, and made his remarks +on them with the utmost freedom:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ille velut fidis arcana sodalibus olim</q></l> +<l>Credebat libris; neque si male gesserat, usquam</l> +<l>Decurrens aliô, neque si bene: quo fit ut omnis</l> +<l>Votivâ pateat veluti descripta tabellâ</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vita senis<note place="foot">Ibid. v. 30.</note>.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Unfortunately, however, the writings of Lucilius are so mutilated, +that few particulars of his life and manners can be +gleaned from them. Little farther is known concerning him, +than that he died at Naples, but at what age has been much +disputed. Eusebius and most other writers have fixed it at 45, +<pb n="239"/><anchor id="Pg239"/>which, as he was born in 605, would be in the 651st year of +the city. But M. Dacier and Bayle<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Dict. Hist. Lucil. G.</hi></note> assert that he must have +been much older, at the time of his death, as he speaks in his +satires of the Licinian law against exorbitant expenditure at +entertainments, which was not promulgated till 657, or 658. +</p> + +<p> +Satire, more than any other species of poetry, is the offspring +of the time in which it has its birth, and which furnishes +it with the aliment whereon it feeds. The period at which +Lucilius appeared was favourable to satiric composition. +There was a struggle existing between the old and new manners, +and the freedom of speaking and writing, though restrained, +had not yet been totally checked by law. Lucilius +lived amidst a people on whom luxury and corruption were +advancing with fearful rapidity, but among whom some virtuous +citizens were still anxious to stem the tide which threatened +to overwhelm their countrymen. The satires of Lucilius were +adapted to please these staunch <q><hi rend="italic">laudatores temporis acti</hi>,</q> +who stood up for ancient manners and discipline. The freedom +with which he attacked the vices of his contemporaries, +without sparing individuals,—the strength of colouring with +which his pictures were charged,—the weight and asperity of +the reproaches with which he loaded those who had exposed +themselves to his ridicule or indignation,—had nothing revolting +in an age when no consideration compelled to those +forbearances necessary under different forms of society or +government<note place="foot">Schoell, <hi rend="italic">Hist. Abregée de la Litterat. Romaine</hi>, Tom. I.</note>. By the time, too, in which Lucilius began to +write, the Romans, though yet far from the polish of the Augustan +age, had become familiar with the delicate and cutting +irony of the Greek comedies of which the more ancient Roman +satirists had no conception. Lucilius chiefly applied himself +to the imitation of these dramatic productions, and caught, it +is said, much of their fire and spirit: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Eupolis, atque Cratinus, Aristophanesque, pöetæ,</q></l> +<l>Atque alii, quorum comœdia prisca virorum est,</l> +<l>Si quis erat dignus describi, quod malus, aut fur,</l> +<l>Quod mœchus foret, aut sicarius, aut alioqui</l> +<l>Famosus, multa cum libertate notabant.</l> +<l>Hinc omnis pendet Lucilius, hosce secutus,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mutatis tantum pedibus numerisque<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. I. <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> 4. v. 1. &c.</note>.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The Roman language, likewise, had grown more refined in the +age of Lucilius, and was thus more capable of receiving the +Grecian beauties of style. Nor did Lucilius, like his prede<pb n="240"/><anchor id="Pg240"/>cessors, mix iambic with trochaic verses. Twenty books of +his satires, from the commencement, were in hexameter verse, +and the rest, with exception of the thirtieth, in iambics or trochaics. +His object, too, seems to have been bolder and more +extensive than that of his precursors, and was not so much to +excite laughter or ridicule, as to correct and chastise vice. +Lucilius thus bestowed on satiric composition such additional +grace and regularity, that he is declared by Horace to have +been the first among the Romans who wrote satire in verse:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Primus in hunc operis componere carmina morem.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But although Lucilius may have greatly improved this sort of +writing, it does not follow that his satires are to be considered +as altogether of a different species from those of Ennius—a +light in which they have been regarded by Casaubon and Ruperti; +<q>for,</q> as Dryden has remarked, <q>it would thence follow, +that the satires of Horace are wholly different from those +of Lucilius, because Horace has no less surpassed Lucilius in +the elegance of his writing, than Lucilius surpassed Ennius in +the turn and ornament of his.</q> +</p> + +<p> +The satires of Lucilius extended to not fewer than thirty +books; but whether they were so divided by the poet himself, +or by some grammarian who lived shortly after him, seems +uncertain: He was a voluminous author, and has been satirized +by Horace for his hurried copiousness and facility:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nam fuit hoc vitiosus: In horâ sæpe ducentos,</q></l> +<l>Ut magnum, versus dictabat, stans pede in uno:</l> +<l>Garrulus, atque piger scribendi ferre laborem;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Scribendi recte: nam ut multum, nil moror<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satir.</hi> Lib. I. Sat. 4. v. 9.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Of the thirty books there are only fragments extant; but these +are so numerous, that though they do not capacitate us to +catch the full spirit of the poet, we perceive something of +his manner. His merits, too, have been so much canvassed +by ancient writers, who judged of them while his works +were yet entire, that their discussions in some measure enable +us to appreciate his poetical claims. It would appear that +he had great vivacity and humour, uncommon command of +language, intimate knowledge of life and manners, and considerable +acquaintance with the Grecian masters. Virtue +appeared in his draughts in native dignity, and he exhibited +his distinguished friends, Scipio and Lælius, in the most amiable +light. At the same time it was impossible to portray +<pb n="241"/><anchor id="Pg241"/>anything more powerful than the sketches of his vicious characters. +His rogue, glutton, and courtezan, are drawn in +strong, not to say coarse colours. He had, however, much +of the old Roman humour, that celebrated but undefined <hi rend="italic">urbanitas</hi>, +which indeed he possessed in so eminent a degree, +that Pliny says it began with Lucilius in composition<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Præf. Hist. Nat.</hi></note>, while +Cicero declares that he carried it to the highest perfection<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Finibus</hi>, Lib. I.</note>, +and that it almost expired with him<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist. Familiares</hi>, Lib. IX. 15.</note>. But the chief characteristic +of Lucilius was his vehement and cutting satire. Macrobius +calls him <q>Acer et violentus poeta<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satur.</hi> Lib. III. c. 16.</note>;</q> and the well-known +lines of Juvenal, who relates how he made the guilty +tremble by his pen, as much as if he had pursued them sword +in hand, have fixed his character as a determined and inexorable +persecutor of vice. His Latin is admitted on all hands +to have been sufficiently pure<note place="foot">Lucilius vir apprime linguæ Latinæ sciens. Au. Gellius, <hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. +XVIII. c. 5. Horat. <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. I. 10. +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Fuerit Lucilius, inquam,</q></l> +<l>Comis et urbanus; fuerit limatior idem</l> +<l>Quam rudis, et Græcis intacti carminis auctor:—</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quamque poetarum seniorum turba.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>; but his versification was rugged +and prosaic. Horace, while he allows that he was more +polished that his predecessors, calls his muse <q>pedestris,</q> +talks repeatedly of the looseness of his measure, <q>Incomposito +pede currere versus,</q> and compares his whole poetry to a +muddy and troubled stream:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Cum flueret lutulentus erat quod tollere velles.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Quintilian does not entirely coincide with this opinion of +Horace; for, while blaming those who considered him as the +greatest of poets, which some persons still did in the age of +Domitian, he says, <q>Ego quantum ab illis, tantum ab Horatio +dissentio, qui Lucilium fluere lutulentum, et esse aliquid quod +tollere possis, putat<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Instit. Orat.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1.</note>.</q> The author of the books <hi rend="italic">Rhetoricorum</hi>, +addressed to Herennius, and which were at one time +attributed to Cicero, mentions, as a singular awkwardness in +the construction of his lines, the disjunction of words, which, +according to proper and natural arrangement, ought to have +been placed together, as— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Has res ad te scriptas <hi rend="italic">Luci</hi> misimus <hi rend="italic">Æli</hi>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Nay, what is still worse, it would appear from Ausonius, that +<pb n="242"/><anchor id="Pg242"/>he had sometimes barbarously separated the syllables of a +word— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Villa <hi rend="italic">Lucani</hi>—mox potieris <hi rend="italic">aco</hi>.</q></l> +<l>Rescisso discas componere nomine versum;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Lucilî vatis sic imitator eris<note place="foot">Auson. <hi rend="italic">in Epist.</hi> 5. ad Theonem.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +As to the learning of Lucilius, the opinions of antiquity were +different; and even those of the same author appear somewhat +contradictory on this point. Quintilian says, that there is +<q>Eruditio in eo mira.</q> Cicero, in his treatise <hi rend="italic">De Finibus</hi>, +calls his learning <hi rend="italic">mediocris</hi>; though, afterwards, in the person +of Crassus, in his treatise <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, he twice terms him +<hi rend="italic">Doctus</hi><note place="foot">Lib. I. c. 16, and Lib. II. Caius Lucilius homo <hi rend="italic">doctus</hi> et perurbanus.</note>. Dacier suspects that Quintilian was led to consider +Lucilius as learned, from the pedantic intermixture of Greek +words in his compositions—a practice which seems to have +excited the applause of his contemporaries, and also of his +numerous admirers in the Augustan age, for which they +have been severely ridiculed by Horace, who always warmly +opposed himself to the excessive partiality entertained for +Lucilius during that golden period of literature— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">At magnum fecit, quod verbis Græca Latinis</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Miscuit:—O seri studiorum!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is not unlikely that there may have been something of +political spleen in the admiration expressed for Lucilius during +the age of Augustus, and something of courtly complaisance +in the attempts of Horace to counteract it. Augustus +had extended the law of the 12 tables respecting libels; and +the people, who found themselves thus abridged of the liberty +of satirizing the Great by name, might not improbably seek +to avenge themselves by an overstrained attachment to the +works of a poet, who, living as they would insinuate, in better +times, practised, without fear, what he enjoyed without +restraint<note place="foot">Gifford’s <hi rend="italic">Juvenal</hi>, Preface, p. xlii.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Some motive of this sort doubtless weighed with the Romans +in the age of Augustus, since much of the satire of +Lucilius must have been unintelligible, or at least uninteresting +to them. Great part of his compositions appears to +have been rather a series of libels than legitimate satire, being +occupied with virulent attacks on contemporary citizens +of Rome— +</p> +<pb n="243"/><anchor id="Pg243"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 10">—— <q rend="post: none">Secuit Lucilius urbem,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Te Mute, te Lupe, et genuinum fregit in illos<note place="foot">Persius, <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> I.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Douza, who has collected and edited all that remains of the +satires of Lucilius, mentions the names of not fewer than sixteen +individuals, who are attacked by name in the course even +of these fragments, among whom are Quintus Opimius, the +conqueror of Liguria, Cæcilius Metellus, whose victories +acquired him the sirname of Macedonianus, and Cornelius +Lupus, at that time <hi rend="italic">Princeps Senatus</hi>. Lucilius was equally +severe on contemporary and preceding authors; Ennius, Pacuvius, +and Attius, having been alternately satirized by him<note place="foot">Au. Gellius, XVII. 21.</note>. +In all this he indulged with impunity<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. II. 1.</note>; but he did not escape +so well from a player, whom he had ventured to censure, and +who took his revenge by exposing Lucilius on the stage. The +poet prosecuted the actor, and the cause was carried on with +much warmth on both sides before the Prætor, who finally +acquitted the player<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Rhetoric. ad Herennium</hi>, Lib. II. c. 13.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The confidence of Lucilius in his powerful patrons, Scipio +and Lælius, inspired this freedom; and it appears, in fact, to +have so completely relieved him from all fear or restraint, that +he boldly exclaims— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">—— <q rend="post: none">Cujus non audeo dicere nomen?</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quid refert dictis ignoscat Mutius, an non?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is chiefly to such support that the unbridled license of the +old Roman satirists may be ascribed— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 10">—— <q rend="post: none">Unde illa priorum</q></l> +<l>Scribendi quodcunque animo flagrante liberet</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Simplicitas<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Juvenal</hi>, <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. I. v. 153.</note>.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The harsh and uncultivated spirit of the ancient Romans also +naturally led to this species of severe and personal castigation; +and it was not to be expected that in that age they should +have drawn their pictures with the delicacy and generality +which Horace has given to Offellus. +</p> + +<p> +Lucilius, however, did not confine himself to invectives on +vicious mortals. In the first book of his satires, he appears +to have declared war on the false gods of Olympus, whose +plurality he denied, and ridiculed the simplicity of the people, +who bestowed on an infinity of gods the venerable name of +father, which should be reserved for one. Near the com<pb n="244"/><anchor id="Pg244"/>mencement of this book he represents an assembly of the gods +deliberating on human affairs: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Consilium summis hominum de rebus habebant.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And, in particular, discussing what punishment ought to be +inflicted on Rutilius Lupus, a considerable man in the Roman +state, but noted for his wickedness and impiety, and so powerful +that it is declared— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Si conjuret, populus vix totus satis est.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Jupiter expresses his regret that he had not been present at +a former council of the gods, called to deliberate on this +topic— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Vellem concilio vestrûm, quod dicitis, olim,</q></l> +<l>Cælicolæ; vellem, inquam, adfuissem priore</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Concilio.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Jupiter having concluded, the subject is taken up by another +of the gods, who, as Lactantius informs us, was Neptune<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Divin. Instit.</hi> Lib. V. c. 15.</note>; +but being puzzled with its intricacy, this divinity declares it +could not be explained, were Carneades himself (the most +clear and eloquent of philosophers) to be sent up to them +from Orcus: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Nec si Carneadem ipsum ad nos Orcus remittat.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The only result of the solemn deliberations of this assembly +is a decree, that each god should receive from mortals the +title of father— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ut nemo sit nostrûm, quin pater optumus divûm;</q></l> +<l>Ut Neptunus pater, Liber, Saturnu’ pater, Mars,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Janu’ Quirinu’ pater, nomen dicatur ad unum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The third book contains an account of the inconveniences +and amusements of a journey, performed by Lucilius, along +the rich coast of Campania, to Capua and Naples, and thence +all the way to Rhegium and the Straits of Messina. He +appears particularly to have described a combat of gladiators, +and the manifold distresses he experienced from the badness +of the roads— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Præterea omne iter hoc est labosum atque lutosum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="245"/><anchor id="Pg245"/> + +<p> +Horace, in the fifth satire of his first book, has, in imitation of +Lucilius, comically described a journey from Rome to Brundusium, +and like him has introduced a gladiatorial combat. +The fourth satire of Lucilius stigmatizes the luxury and vices +of the rich, and has been imitated by Persius in his third +book. Aulus Gellius informs us, that in part of his fifth satire +he exposed, with great wit and power of ridicule, those +literary affectations of using such words in one sentence as +terminate with a similar jingle, or consist of an equal number +of syllables. He has shown how childish such affectations +are, in that passage wherein he complains to a friend that he +had neglected to visit him while sick. In the ninth satire he +ridicules the blunders in orthography, committed by the transcribers +of MSS., and gives rules for greater accuracy. Of +the tenth book little remains; but it is said to have been the +perusal of it which first inflamed Persius with the rage of +writing satires. The eleventh seems to have consisted chiefly +of personal invectives against Quintus Opimius, Lucius Cotta, +and others of his contemporaries, whose vices, or rivalship +with his patron Scipio, exposed them to his enmity and +vengeance. The sixteenth was entitled <hi rend="italic">Collyra</hi>, having been +chiefly devoted to the celebration of the praises of Collyra, +the poet’s mistress<note place="foot">Porphyrion, <hi rend="italic">In Horat.</hi> Lib. I. Ode 20.</note>. Of many of the other books, as the +12th, 13th, 18th, 21st, and four following, so small fragments +remain, that it is impossible to conjecture the subject; for +although we may see the scope of insulated lines, their matter +may have been some incidental illustration, and not the principal +subject of the satire. Even in those books, of which +there are a greater number of fragments extant, they are so +disjoined that it is as difficult to put them legibly together as +the scattered leaves of the Sibyl; and the labour of Douza, +who has been the most successful in arranging the broken +lines, so as to make a connected sense, is by many considered +as but a conjectural and philological sport. Those few passages, +however, which are in any degree entire, show great +force of satire; as for example, the following account of the +life led by the Romans:— +</p> + +<lg> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nunc vero a mane ad noctem, festo atque profesto,</q></l> +<l>Totus item pariterque dies, populusque patresque</l> +<l>Jactare indu foro se omnes, decedere nusquam,</l> +<l>Uni se atque eidem studio omnes dedere et arti;</l> +<l>Verba dare ut caute possint, pugnare dolose,</l> +<l>Blanditia certare, bonum simulare virum se,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Insidias facere, ut si hostes sint omnibus omnes.</q></l> +</lg> + +<pb n="246"/><anchor id="Pg246"/> + +<p> +The verses in which our poet bitterly ridicules the superstition +of those who adored idols, and mistook them for true +gods, are written in something of the same spirit— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Terricolas Lamias, Fauni quas, Pompiliique</q></l> +<l>Instituere Numæ, tremit has, his omnia ponit:</l> +<l>Ut pueri infantes credunt signa omnia ahena </l> +<l>Vivere, et esse homines; et sic isti omnia ficta</l> +<l>Vera putant: credunt signis cor inesse ahenis—</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Pergula pictorum, veri nihil, omnia ficta<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">They dread hobgoblins hatch’d in folly’s brain,</q></l> +<l>The idle phantoms of old Numa’s reign.</l> +<l>As infant children sculptured forms believe</l> +<l>To be live men—so they themselves deceive—</l> +<l>To whom vain forms of superstition’s dream</l> +<l>Of Life and truth the real figures seem.</l> +<l>Fools! they as well might think there stirs a heart,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Of vital power, in images of art.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +On this passage Lactantius remarks, that such superstitious +fools are much more absurd than the children to whom the +satirist compares them, as the latter only mistake statues for +men, the former for gods. There are two lines in the 26th +book, which every nation should remember in the hour of +disaster— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ut populus Romanus victus vi, et superatus præliis</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Sæpe est multis; bello vero nunquam, in quo sunt omnia<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">In various fights the Roman arms have failed;</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Still in the war the Roman power prevailed.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But the most celebrated and longest passage we now have +from Lucilius, is his definition of <hi rend="italic">Virtus</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Virtus, Albine, est, pretium persolvere verum,</q></l> +<l>Queis in versamur, queis vivimus rebus, potesse:</l> +<l>Virtus est homini, scire id quod quæque habeat res;</l> +<l>Virtus, scire homini rectum, utile, quid sit honestum,</l> +<l>Quæ bona, quæ mala item, quid inutile, turpe, inhonestum;</l> +<l>Virtus, quærendæ rei finem scire modumque:</l> +<l>Virtus, divitiis precium persolvere posse:</l> +<l>Virtus, id dare quod re ipsa debetur honori;</l> +<l>Hostem esse atque inimicum hominum morumque malorum,</l> +<l>Contra, defensorem hominum morumque bonorum,</l> +<l>Magnificare hos, his bene velle, his vivere amicum:</l> +<l>Commoda præterea patriæ sibi prima putare,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Deinde parentûm, tertia jam postremaque nostra<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Virtue, Albinus, is—A constant will</q></l> +<l>The claims of duty ably to fulfil—</l> +<l>Virtue is knowledge of the just, sincere,</l> +<l>The good, the ill, the useless, base, unfair.</l> +<l>What we should wish to gain, for what to pray,</l> +<l>This virtue teaches, and each vow to pay;</l> +<l>Honour she gives to whom it may belong,</l> +<l>But hates the base, and flies from what is wrong—</l> + <l>A bold protector of the just and pure,</l> +<l>She feels for such a friendship fond and sure—</l> +<l>Her country’s good commands her warmest zeal.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Kindred the next, and latest private weal.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="247"/><anchor id="Pg247"/> + +<p> +Lactantius has cavilled at the different heads of this definition<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Div. Instit.</hi> Lib. VI. c. 5 and 6.</note>, +and perhaps some of them are more applicable to what +we call wisdom, than to our term virtue, which, as is well +known, does not precisely correspond to the Latin <hi rend="italic">Virtus</hi>. +</p> + +<p> +If we possessed a larger portion of the writings of Lucilius, +I have no doubt it would be found that subsequent Latin +poets, particularly the satirists, have not only copied various +passages, but adopted the plan and subjects of many of his +satires. It has already been mentioned, that Horace’s journey +to Brundusium is imitated from that of Lucilius to Capua. +His severity recommended him to Persius and Juvenal, who +both mention him with respect. Persius, indeed, professes to +follow him, but Juvenal seems a closer imitator of his manner. +The jingle in the two following lines, from an uncertain book +of Lucilius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ut me scire volo mihi conscius sum, ne</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Damnum faciam. Scire hoc se nescit, nisi alios id scire scierit,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +seems to have suggested Persius’ line— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Scire tuum nihil, nisi te scire hoc sciat alter.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The verses, <q>Cujus non audeo dicere nomen,</q> &c. quoted +above, are copied by Juvenal in his first satire, but with evident +allusion to the works of his predecessor. A line in the first +book— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quis leget hæc? mîn’ tu istud ais? nemo, Hercule, nemo,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +has been imitated by Persius in the very commencement of +his satires— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">O curas hominum! O quantum est in rebus inane!</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quis leget hæc? mîn’ tu istud ais? nemo, Hercule, nemo.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Virgil’s phrase, so often quoted, <q>Non omnia possumus +omnes,</q> is in the fifth book of Lucilius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Major erat natu; non omnia possumus omnes.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Were the whole works of Lucilius extant, many more such +imitations might be discovered and pointed out. It is not on +<pb n="248"/><anchor id="Pg248"/>this account, however, that their loss is chiefly to be deplored. +Had they remained entire, they would have been highly +serviceable to philological learning. They would have +informed us also of many incidents of Roman history, and +would have presented us with the most complete draught of +ancient Roman manners, and genuine Roman originals, which +were painted from life, and at length became the model of +the inimitable satires of imperial Rome. +</p> + +<p> +Besides satirizing the wicked, under which category he +probably classed all his enemies, Lucilius also employed his +pen in praise of the brave and virtuous. He wrote, as we +learn from Horace, a panegyric on Scipio Africanus, but +whether the elder or younger is not certain:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Attamen et justum poteras et scribere fortem</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Scipiadam, ut sapiens Lucilius<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. II. 1.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Lucilius was also author of a comedy entitled <hi rend="italic">Nummularia</hi>, +of which only one line remains; but we are informed by Porphyrion, +the scholiast on Horace, that the plot turned on Pythias, +a female slave, tricking her master, Simo, out of a sum +of money, with which to portion his daughter. +</p> + +<p> +Lucilius was followed in his satiric career by Sævius Nicanor, +the grammarian, who was the freedman of one Marcius, +as we learn from the only line of his poetry which is extant, +and which has been preserved by Suetonius, or whoever was +the author of the work <hi rend="italic">De Illustribus Grammaticis</hi>:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Sævius Nicanor Marci libertus negabit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Publius Terentius Varro, sirnamed Atacinus, from the place +of his birth, also attempted the Lucilian satire, but with no +great success as we learn from Horace:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Hoc erat, experto frustra Varrone Atacino.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +He was more fortunate, it is said, in his geographical poems, +and in that <hi rend="italic">De Bello Sequanico</hi><note place="foot">Concerning Varro Atacinus, see Wernsdorff, <hi rend="italic">Poet. Lat. Minor.</hi> Tom. VI. p. +1385, &c. Ed. Altenburg, 1780.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +We may range among the satires of this period, the <hi rend="italic">Diræ</hi> +of the grammarian, Valerius Cato, who, being despoiled of his +patrimony, especially his favourite villa at Tusculum, during +the civil wars of Marius and Sylla, in order to make way for +the soldiery, avenged himself, by writing poetical imprecations +on his lost property. This poem is sometimes inscribed +<pb n="249"/><anchor id="Pg249"/><hi rend="italic">Diræ in Battarum</hi>, which is inaccurate, as it gives an idea +that Battarus is the name of the person who had got possession +of the villa, and on whom the imprecations were uttered. +There is not, however, a word of execration against any of +those who had obtained his lands, except in so far as he +curses the lands themselves, praying that they may become +barren—that they may be inundated with rain—blasted with +pestiferous breezes, and, in short, laid waste by every species +of agricultural calamity. Joseph Scaliger thinks that Battarus +was a river, and Nic. Heinsius that it was a hill. It seems +evident enough from the poem itself, that Battarus was some +well known satiric or invective bard, whom the author invokes, +in order to excite himself to reiterated imprecations<note place="foot">Wernsdorff, <hi rend="italic">Poet. Lat. Minores</hi>, + <hi rend="italic"><anchor id="corr249"/><corr sic="Praef.">Præf.</corr></hi> Tom. III. p. LIV. &c.</note>:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Rursus et hoc iterum repetamus, Battare, carmen.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The concluding part of the <hi rend="italic">Diræ</hi>, as edited by Wernsdorff<note place="foot">Ibid. p. 1.</note>, +is a lamentation for the loss of a mistress, called Lydia, of +whom the unfortunate poet had likewise been deprived. This, +however, has been regarded by others as a separate poem +from the <hi rend="italic">Diræ</hi>. Cato was also author of a poem called <hi rend="italic">Diana</hi>, +and a prose work entitled <hi rend="italic">Indignatio</hi>, in which he related the +history of his misfortunes. He lived to an advanced age, but +was oppressed by extreme poverty, and afflicted with a painful +disease, as seems to be implied in the lines of his friend +Furius Bibaculus, preserved in the treatise <hi rend="italic">De Illustribus +Grammaticis</hi>:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quem tres calculi, et selibra farris,</q></l> +<l>Racemi duo, tegula sub unâ,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ad summam prope nutriunt senectam<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">On half a pound three grains of barley bread,</q></l> +<l>With two small bunches of dried grapes, he fed,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">And met old age beneath a paltry shed.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The stream of Roman poetry appears to have suffered a +temporary stagnation during the period that elapsed from the +destruction of Carthage, which fell in 607, till the death of +Sylla, in 674. Lucilius, with whose writings we have been +engaged, was the only poet who flourished in this long interval. +The satirical compositions which he introduced were +not very generally nor successfully imitated. The race of +dramatists had become almost extinct, and even the fondness +for regular comedy and tragedy had greatly diminished. This +<pb n="250"/><anchor id="Pg250"/>was a pause, (though for a shorter period,) like that which +was made in modern Italy, from the death of Petrarch till the +rise of its bright constellation of poets, at the end of the 15th +century. But the taste for literature which had been excited, +and the luminous events which occurred, prevented either +nation from being again enveloped in darkness. The ancient +Romans could not be electrified by the fall of Carthage +as their descendants were by the capture of Constantinople. +But even the total subjugation of Greece, and extended dominion +in Asia, were slower, at least in their influence on the +efforts of poetry, than might have been anticipated from what +was experienced immediately after the conquest of Magna +Græcia. Any retrograde movement, however, was prevented +by the more close and frequent intercourse which was opened +with Greece. There, Athens and Rhodes were the chief +allies of the Roman republic. These states had renounced +their freedom, for the security which flattery and subservience +obtained for them; but while they ceased to be considerable +in power, they still continued pre eminent in learning. A +number of military officers and civil functionaries, whom their +respective employments carried to Greece—a number of citizens, +whom commercial speculations attracted to its towns, +became acquainted with and cherished Grecian literature. +That contempt which the ancient and severe republicans had +affected for its charms, gave place to the warmest enthusiasm. +The Roman youth were instructed by Greeks, or by Romans +who had studied in Greece. A literary tour in that country +was regarded as forming an essential part in the education +of a young patrician. Rhodes, Mitylene, and Athens, were +chiefly resorted to, as the purest fountains from which the inspiring +draughts of literature could be imbibed. This constant +intercourse led to a knowledge of the philosophy and finest +classical productions of Greece. It was thus that Lucretius +was enabled to embody in Roman verse the whole Epicurean +system, and Catullus to imitate or translate the lighter amatory +and epigrammatic compositions of the Greeks. Both these +poets flourished during the period on which we are now entering, +and which extended from the death of Sylla to the accession +of Augustus. The former of them, +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Titus Lucretius Carus"/><index index="pdf" level1="Titus Lucretius Carus"/> +<head>TITUS LUCRETIUS CARUS,</head> + +<p> +was the most remarkable of the Roman writers, as he united +the precision of the philosopher to the fire and fancy of the +poet; and, while he seems to have had no perfect model +<pb n="251"/><anchor id="Pg251"/>among the Greeks, has left a production unrivalled, (perhaps +not to be rivalled,) by any of the same kind in later ages. +</p> + +<p> +Of the life of Lucretius very little is known: He lived at a +period abounding with great political actors, and full of portentous +events—a period when every bosom was agitated with +terror or hope, and when it must have been the chief study of +a prudent man, especially if a votary of philosophy and the +Muses, to hide himself as much as possible amid the shades. +The year of his birth is uncertain. According to the chronicle +of Eusebius, he was born in 658, being thus nine years younger +than Cicero, and two or three younger than Cæsar. To judge +from his style, he might be supposed older than either: but +this, as appears from the example of Sallust, is no certain test, +as his archaisms may have arisen from the imitation of ancient +writers; and we know that he was a fond admirer of Ennius. +</p> + +<p> +A taste for Greek philosophy had been excited at Rome for +a considerable time before this era, and Lucretius was sent, +with other young Romans of rank, to study at Athens. The +different schools of philosophy in that city seem, about this +period, to have been frequented according as they received a +temporary fashion from the comparative abilities of the professors +who presided in them. Cicero, for example, who had +attended the Epicurean school at Athens, and became himself +an Academic, intrusted his son to the care of Cratippus, a peripatetic +philosopher. After the death of its great founder, the +school of Epicurus had for some time declined in Greece: but +at the period when Lucretius was sent to Athens, it had again +revived under the patronage of L. Memmius, whose son was a +fellow-student of Lucretius; as were also Cicero, his brother +Quintus, Cassius, and Pomponius Atticus. At the time when +frequented by these illustrious youths, the Gardens of Epicurus +were superintended by Zeno and Phædrus, both of whom, but +particularly the latter, have been honoured with the panegyric +of Cicero. <q>We formerly, when we were boys,</q> says he, in +a letter to Caius Memmius, <q>knew him as a profound philosopher, +and we still recollect him as a kind and worthy man, +ever solicitous for our improvement<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist. Famil.</hi> Lib. XIII.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +One of the dearest, perhaps the dearest friend of Lucretius, +was this Memmius, who had been his school-fellow, and whom, +it is supposed, he accompanied to Bithynia, when appointed to +the government of that province<note place="foot">Good’s <hi rend="italic">Lucretius. Pref.</hi> p. XXXVI.</note>. The poem <hi rend="italic">De Rerum Natura</hi>, +if not undertaken at the request of Memmius, was doubtless +much encouraged by him; and Lucretius, in a dedication +<pb n="252"/><anchor id="Pg252"/>expressed in terms of manly and elegant courtesy, very different +from the servile adulation of some of his great successors, +tells him, that the much desired pleasure of his friendship, was +what enabled him to endure any toil or vigils— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Sed tua me virtus tamen, et sperata voluptas</q></l> +<l>Suavis amicitiæ, quemvis ecferre laborem</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Suadet, et inducit nocteis vigilare serenas.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The life of the poet was short, but happily was sufficiently +prolonged to enable him to complete his poem, though, perhaps, +not to give some portions of it their last polish. According +to Eusebius, he died in the 44th year of his age, by +his own hands, in a paroxysm of insanity, produced by a philtre, +which Lucilia, his wife or mistress, had given him, with no +design of depriving him of life or reason, but to renew or increase +his passion. Others suppose that his mental alienation +proceeded from melancholy, on account of the calamities of his +country, and the exile of Memmius,—circumstances which +were calculated deeply to affect his mind<note place="foot"><lg><l><q rend="post: none">Nam neque nos agere hoc patriäi tempore iniquo</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Possumus æquo animo,</q> &c.—Lib. I. v. 42.</l></lg></note>. There seems no +reason to doubt the melancholy fact, that he perished by his +own hand. +</p> + +<p> +The poem of Lucretius, <hi rend="italic">De Rerum Natura</hi>, which he composed +during the lucid intervals of his malady, is, as the name +imports, philosophic and didactic, in the strictest acceptation +of these terms. Poetry, I think, may chiefly be considered as +occupied in three ways.—1. As describing the passions of men, +with the circumstances which give birth to them.—2. As +painting images or scenery.—3. As communicating truth. Of +these classes of poetry, the most interesting is the first, in +which we follow the hero placed at short intervals in different +situations, calculated to excite various sympathies in our +heart, while our imagination is at the same time amused or +astonished by the singularity of the incidents which such situations +produce. Those poems, therefore, are the most attractive, +in which, as in the <hi rend="italic">Odyssey</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Orlando</hi>, knights or +warriors plough unknown seas, and wander in strange lands—where, +at every new horizon which opens, we look for countries +inhabited by giants, or monsters, or wizards of supernatural +powers—where, whether sailing on the deep, or +anchoring on the shore, the hero dreads— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Lest Gorgons, rising from infernal lakes,</q></l> +<l>With horrors armed, and curls of hissing snakes,</l> +<l>Should fix him, stiffened at the monstrous sight,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">A stony image in eternal night.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="253"/><anchor id="Pg253"/> + +<p> +These are the themes of surest and most powerful effect: It is +by these that we are most truely moved; and it is the choice +of such subjects, if ably conducted, which chiefly stamps the +poet— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Humanæ Dominum mentis, cordisque Tyrannum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +So strongly, indeed, and so universally, has this been felt, +that in the second species of poetry, the <hi rend="italic">Descriptive</hi>, our sympathy +must be occasionally awakened by the actions or passions +of human beings; and, to ensure success, the poet must +describe the effects of the appearance of nature on our sensations. +<q>In the poem of the <hi rend="italic">Shipwreck</hi>,</q> says Lord Byron, <q>is +it the storm or the ship which most interests?—Both much, +undoubtedly; but without the vessel, what should we care for +the tempest<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Letter on Bowles’s Strictures on Pope</hi>.</note>?</q> Virgil had early felt, that without Lycoris, +the <hi rend="italic">gelidi fontes</hi> and <hi rend="italic">mollia prata</hi> would seem less refreshing +and less smooth—he had found that the grass and the groves +withered at the departure, but revived at the return of Phyllis. +The most soothing and picturesque of the incidents of a woodland +landscape,—the blue smoke curling upwards from a cottage +concealed by the trees, derives half its softening charm, +by reminding us— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>That in the same did wonne some living wight.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Of all the three species above enumerated, <hi rend="italic">Philosophical</hi> +poetry, which occupies the mind with minute portions of external +nature, is the least attractive. Mankind will always +prefer books which move to those which instruct—<hi rend="italic">ennui</hi> being +more burdensome than ignorance. In philosophic poetry, our +imagination cannot be gratified by the desert isles, the boundless +floods, or entangled forests, with all the marvels they conceal, +which rise in such rapid and rich succession in the +fascinating narrative of the sea tost Ulysses<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἐιδον γαρ σκοπιην ἐς παιπαλοεσσαν ἀνελθων,</foreign><!--[Greek: Eidon gar skopiên es paipaloessan anelthôn,--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Νησον, την περι ποντος απειριτος ἐστεφανωται·</foreign><!--Nêson, tên peri pontos apeiritos estephanôtai·--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἀυτη δε χθαμαλη κεῖται καπνον δ’ ενι μεσσῃ</foreign><!--Autê de chthamalê keitai kapnon d' eni messê--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Εδρακον οφθαλμοῖσι δια δρυμα πυκνα και ὑλην.</foreign><!--Edrakon ophthalmoisi dia dryma pykna kai hulên.]--></q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 14"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Οδυσ. Κ.</foreign><!--[Greek: Odys. K.]--></l> +</lg></note>; nor can we there +have our curiosity roused, and our emotions excited, by such +lines as those with which Ariosto awakens the attention of his +readers— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Non furo iti duo miglia, che sonare</q></l> +<l>Odon la selva, che gli cinge intorno,</l> +<l>Con tal rumor et strepito che pare</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Che tremi la foresta d’ogni intorno.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="254"/><anchor id="Pg254"/> + +<p> +Besides, as has been observed by Montesquieu, reason is +sufficiently chained, though we fetter her not with rhyme; and, +on the other hand, poetry loses much of its freedom and lightness, +if clogged with the bonds of reason. The great object +of poetry (according to a trite remark,) is to afford pleasure; +but philosophic poetry affords less pleasure than epic, descriptive, +or dramatic. The versifier of philosophic subjects is in +danger of producing a work neither interesting enough for +the admirers of sentiment and imagination, nor sufficiently +profound for philosophers. He will sometimes soar into regions +where many of his readers are unable to follow him, and, +at other times, he will lose the suffrage of a few, by interweaving +fictions amid the severe and simple truth. +</p> + +<p> +It is the business of the philosopher to analyze the objects +of nature. He must pay least attention to those which chiefly +affect the sense and imagination, while he minutely considers +others, which, though less striking, are more useful for classification, +and the chief purposes he has in view. The poet, on +the other hand, avoiding dry and abstract definitions, rather +combines than analyzes, and dwells more on the sensible +phænomena of nature, than her mysterious and scientific +workings. Thus, what the botanist considers is the number of +<hi rend="italic">stamina</hi>, and their situation in a flower, while the Muse describes +only its colours, and the influence of its odours— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">She loves the rose, by rivers loves to dream,</q></l> +<l>Nor heeds why blooms the rose, why flows the stream—</l> +<l>She loves its colours, though she may not know,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Why sun-born Iris paints the showery bow.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But though philosophic poetry be, of all others, the most +unfavourable for the exertion of poetical genius, its degree +of beauty and interest will, in a great measure, depend on +what parts of his subject the poet selects, and on the extent +and number of digressions of which it admits. It is evident, +that the philosophic poet should pass over as lightly as may +be, all dry and recondite doctrines, and enlarge on the topics +most susceptible of poetical ornament. <q>Le Tableau de la +Nature Physique,</q> says Voltaire, <q rend="post: none">est lui seule d’une richesse, +d’une varieté, d’une etendue à occuper des siécles d’étude; +mais tous les details ne sont pas favorable à la poésie. On +n’ exige pas du poete les meditations du physicien et les calculs +de l’astronomie: c’est à l’observateur à déterminer l’attraction +et les mouvemens des corps celestes; c’est au poete à +peindre leur balancement, leur harmonie, et leurs immuables +révolutions. L’un distinguera les classes nombreuses d’etres +organisés qui peuplent les elémens divers; l’autre décririra +<pb n="255"/><anchor id="Pg255"/>d’un trait hardi, lumineux et rapide cette echelle immense et +continue, ou les limites des regnes se confondent. Que le +confident de la nature develope le prodige de la greffe des +arbres—c’est assez pour Virgile de l’exprimer en deux beaux +vers—</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Exiit ad cœlum ramis felicibus arbos,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Miraturque novas frondes et non sua poma<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Encyclopédie Methodique</hi>.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +With regard, again, to digressions, Racine, (le Fils) in speaking +of didactic poetry, says there are two sorts of episodes +which may be introduced into it, and which he terms episodes +of narrative and of style, (<hi rend="italic">De Recit et de Style</hi>,) meaning by +the former the recital of the adventures of individuals, and by +the latter, general reflections suggested by the subject<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Reflexions sur la Poésie</hi>. <hi rend="italic">Œuvres</hi>, Tom. V.</note>. +Without some embellishment of this description, most philosophic +poems will correspond to Quintilian’s account of the +poem of Aratus on astronomy, <q>Nulla varietas, nullus affectus, +nulla persona, nulla cujusquam, est oratio<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Inst. Orat.</hi> Lib. X. c. 1.</note>.</q> From what has +already been said concerning the extreme interest excited by +the introduction of sentient beings, with all their perils around, +and all their passions within them, it follows, that where the +subject admits, episodes of the first class will best serve the +purposes of poetry, and if the poet choose such dry and abstruse +topics as cosmogony, or the generation of the world, +he ought to follow the example of Silenus<note place="foot">Virgil. <hi rend="italic">Eclog.</hi> 6.</note>, by embellishing +his subject with tales of Hylas, and Philomela, and Scylla, +and the gardens of the Hesperides—the themes which induce +us to listen to the lay of the poet— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Cogere donec oves stabulis, numerumque referre,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Jussit, et invito processit Vesper Olympo.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is, however, with the second class of episodes—with declamations +against luxury and vice—reflections on the beauty +of virtue—and the delights of rural retirement, that Lucretius +hath chiefly gemmed his verses. +</p> + +<p> +The poem of Lucretius contains a full exposition of the +theological, physical, and moral system of Epicurus. It has +been remarked by an able writer, <q>that all the religious systems +of the ancient Pagan world were naturally perishable, +from the quantity of false opinions, and vicious habits, and +ceremonies that were attached to them.</q> He observes even +<pb n="256"/><anchor id="Pg256"/>of the barbarous Anglo Saxons, that, <q>as the nation advanced +in its active intellect, it began to be dissatisfied with its mythology. +Many indications exist of this spreading alienation, +which prepared the northern mind for the reception of the +nobler truths of Christianity<note place="foot">Turner’s <hi rend="italic">History of the Anglo Saxons</hi>, Vol. III. pp. 311, 356, ed. London, +1820, where proofs are given.</note>.</q> A secret incredulity of this +sort seems to have been long nourished in Greece, and appears +to have been imported into Rome with its philosophy and +literature. The more pure and simple religion of early Rome +was quickly corrupted, and the multitude of ideal and heterogeneous +beings which superstition introduced into the Roman +worship led to its total rejection<note place="foot">Pliny, <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. II. 7.</note>. This infidelity is very +obvious in the writings of Ennius, who translated Euhemerus’ +work on the Deification of Human Spirits, while Plautus +dramatized the vices of the father of the gods and tutelary +deity of Rome. The doctrine of materialism was introduced +at Rome during the age of Scipio and Lælius<note place="foot"><q>Neque enim assentior iis,</q> says Lælius, in Cicero’s Dialogue, <hi rend="italic">De Amicitia</hi>, +<q>qui hæc nuper disserere cœperunt, cum corporibus simul animos interire, atque +omnia morte deleri.</q> (c. 4.)</note>; and perhaps +no stronger proof of its rapid progress and prevalence can be +given, than that Cæsar, though a priest, and ultimately Pontifex +Maximus, boldly proclaimed in the senate, that death is +the end of all things, and that beyond it there is neither hope +nor joy. This state of the public mind was calculated to give +a fashion to the system of Epicurus<note place="foot"><q>Priscarum religionum metus,</q> says Heyne, talking of the time of the civil +wars of Sylla, <q>jam adeo dispulsus erat, ut ne ipsa quidem Loyolæ cohors immissa, +novas tenebras, novos terrores offundere animis potuisset.</q> (<hi rend="italic">Opuscula</hi>, Tom. IV.)</note>. According to this +distinguished philosopher, the chief good of man is pleasure, +of which the elements consist, in having a body free from +pain, and a mind tranquil and exempt from perturbation. Of +this tranquility there are, according to Epicurus, as expounded +by Lucretius, two chief enemies, superstition, or slavish fear +of the gods, and the dread of death<note place="foot">Lib. II. v. 43, 44, 45–60. It is well known what a clamour was excited +against Epicurus, founded on the ambiguity of the word which has been translated +pleasure, but which would be more accurately interpreted happiness. A similar +outcry was, in later ages, raised by one of his opponents against Malebranche, who, +like Epicurus, lived not merely temperately, but abstemiously. <q>Regis,</q> (says +Fontenelle,) <q>attaqua Malebranche sur ce qu’il avoit avancé que <hi rend="italic">le plaisir rend +heureux</hi>. Ainsi malgré sa vie plus que philosophique et tres chrêtienne il se trouva +le protecteur de plaisirs. A la verité la question devint si subtile et si metaphysique, +que leurs plus grands partizans auroient mieux aimés y renoncer pour toute leur vie, +que d’etre obligés à les soutenir comme lui.</q> <hi rend="italic">Eloges, Malebranche</hi>.</note>. In order to oppose +these two foes to happiness, he endeavours, in the first place, +to shew that the world was formed by a fortuitous concourse +<pb n="257"/><anchor id="Pg257"/>of atoms, and that the gods, who, according to the popular +theology, were constantly interposing, take no concern whatever +in human affairs. We do injustice to Epicurus when +we estimate his tenets by the refined and exalted ideas of a +philosophy purified by faith, without considering the superstitious +and polluted notions prevalent in his time. <q>The +idea of Epicurus,</q> (as is observed by Dr Drake,) <q>that it is +the nature of gods to enjoy an immortality in the bosom of +perpetual peace, infinitely remote from all relation to this +globe, free from care, from sorrow, and from pain, supremely +happy in themselves, and neither rejoicing in the pleasures, +nor concerned for the evils of humanity—though perfectly +void of any rational foundation, yet possesses much moral +charm when compared with the popular religions of Greece +and Rome. The felicity of their deities consisted in the +vilest debauchery; nor was there a crime, however deep its +dye, that had not been committed and gloried in by some one +of their numerous objects of worship<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Literary Hours</hi>, Vol. I. p. 11. Dr Drake wrote two essays, to announce and +recommend the translation of Lucretius by his friend Mr Good. The latter, in his +notes, displays a prodigious extent of reading in almost all languages; but neither +of them is very accurate. Dr Drake, for example, remarks, <q>that the <hi rend="italic">Alieuticon</hi> +and <hi rend="italic"><anchor id="corr257"/><corr sic="Cynogeticon">Cynegeticon</corr></hi> of Oppian, though conveying precepts in verse, can with scarce +any probability be considered as furnishing a model for the philosophic genius of +the Roman.</q> (P. 3.) Oppian wrote towards the close of the second century of the +Christian æra. Mr Good also makes Suetonius appeal for some fact to Athenæus. +(Vol. I. p. 25.)</note>.</q> Never, also, could +the doctrine, that the gods take no concern in human affairs, +appear more plausible than in the age of Lucretius, when +the destiny of man seemed to be the sport of the caprice of +such a monster as Sylla. +</p> + +<p> +With respect to the other great leading tenet of Lucretius +and his master—the mortality of the soul, still greater injustice +is done to the philosopher and poet. It is affirmed, and +justly, by a great Apostle, that life and immortality have been +brought to light by the gospel; and yet an author who lived +before this dawn is reviled because he asserts, that the natural +arguments for the immortality of the soul, afforded by the +analogies of nature, or principle of moral retribution, are weak +and inconclusive! In fact, however, it is not by the truth of +the system or general philosophical views in a poem, (for +which no one consults it,) that its value is to be estimated; +since a poetical work may be highly moral on account of its +details, even when its systematic scope is erroneous or apparently +dangerous. Notwithstanding passages which seem to +<pb n="258"/><anchor id="Pg258"/>echo Spinosism, and almost to justify crime<note place="foot">As a specimen of rank Spinosism, we find— + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">All are but parts of one stupendous whole,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Whose body Nature is, and God the soul;</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +and for an apparent justification of crime,— + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">If plagues and earthquakes break not Heaven’s design,</q></l> +<l>Why, then, a Borgia or a Catiline. </l> +<l> * * * *</l> +<l>In spite of pride, in erring reason’s spite,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">One truth is clear,—Whatever is, is right.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>, the <hi rend="italic">Essay on +Man</hi> is rightly considered as the most moral production of +our most moral poet. In like manner, where shall we find +exhortations more eloquent than those of Lucretius, against +ambition and cruelty, and luxury and lust,—against all the +dishonest pleasures of the body, and all the turbulent passions +of the mind. +</p> + +<p> +In versifying the philosophical system of Epicurus, Lucretius +appears to have taken Empedocles as his model. All the +old Grecian bards of whom we have any account prior to Homer, +as Orpheus, Linus, and Musæus, are said to have written +poems on the driest and most difficult philosophical questions, +particularly the generation of the world. The ancients evidently +considered philosophical poetry as of the highest kind, +and its themes are invariably placed in the mouths of their +divinest songsters<note place="foot">Apollonius Rhodius, Lib. I. Virgil, <hi rend="italic">Æneid</hi>, Lib. I.</note>. Whether Lucretius may have been +indebted to any such ancient poems, still extant in his age, or +to the subsequent productions of Palæphatus the Athenian, +Antiochus, or Eratosthenes, who, as Suidas informs us, wrote +poems on the structure of the world, it is impossible now to +determine; but he seems to have considerably availed himself +of the work of Empedocles. The poem of that sumptuous, +accomplished, and arrogant philosopher, entitled <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Περι φυσεως</foreign><!--[Greek: Peri physeôs]-->, +and inscribed to his pupil Pausanias, was chiefly illustrative +of the Pythagorean philosophy, in which he had been initiated. +Aristotle speaks on the subject of the merits of Empedocles +in a manner which does not seem to be perfectly +consistent<note place="foot">ap. Eichstadt. Lucret. p. lxxxvii. ci. cii. ed. Lips. 1801.</note>; but we know that his poem was sufficiently +celebrated to be publicly recited at the Olympic games, along +with the works of Homer. Only a few fragments of his writings +remain; from which, perhaps, it would be as unfair to +judge him, as to estimate Lucretius by extracts from the physical +portions of his poem. Those who have collected the +detached fragments of his production<note place="foot">The fragments of Empedocles have been chiefly preserved by Simplicius, in a +Greek commentary on Aristotle, written about the middle of the sixth century. This +commentary, with the verses of Empedocles which it comprehended, was translated into Latin in the thirteenth century; and at the revival of literature, the original +Simplicius having disappeared, it was as happened to various other works retranslated +from the Latin into Greek, and in this form was printed by Aldus, in 1526. +Sturz published the <hi rend="italic">Remains of Empedocles</hi> from this Aldine edition, with a great +literary apparatus, at Leipsic, in 1805, but with some remodelling, to force them into +accurate verse, which they had lost in their successive transmutations. Subsequent, +however, to this attempt, Professor Peyron discovered, in the Ambrosian library at +Milan, the original Greek of Simplicius, with the genuine verses of Empedocles, +which have been reprinted at Leipsic, in 1810, from the Italian edition.</note>, think that it had been +<pb n="259"/><anchor id="Pg259"/>divided into three books; the first treating of the elements +and universe,—the second of animals and man,—the third of +the soul, as also of the nature and worship of the gods. His +philosophical system was different from that of Lucretius; but +he had discussed almost all the subjects on which the Roman +bard afterwards expatiated. In particular, Lucretius appears +to have derived from his predecessor his notion of the original +generation of man from the teeming earth,—the production, +at the beginning of the world, of a variety of defective +monsters, which were not allowed to multiply their kinds,—the +distribution of animals according to the prevalence of one +or other of the four elements over the rest in their composition,—the +vicissitudes of matter between life and inanimate substance,—and +the leading doctrine, <q>mortem nihil ad nos pertinere,</q> +because absolute insensibility is the consequence of +dissolution<note place="foot">Sturz, <hi rend="italic">Empedoclis Fragmenta</hi>. Cicero, <hi rend="italic">De Finibus</hi>, Lib. II.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +If Lucretius has in any degree benefited by the works of +Empedocles, he has in return been most lavish and eloquent +in his commendations. One of the most delightful features +in the character of the Latin poet is, the glow of admiration +with which he writes of his illustrious predecessors. His +eulogy of the Sicilian philosopher, which he has so happily +combined with that of the country which gave him birth, +affords a beautiful example of his manner of infusing into +everything a poetic sweetness, <hi rend="italic">Musæo contingens cuncta +lepore</hi>,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Quorum Agragantinus cum primis Empedocles est:</q></l> +<l>Insula quem Triquetris terrarum gessit in oris:</l> +<l>Quam fluitans circum magnis anfractibus, æquor</l> +<l>Ionium glaucis aspergit virus ab undis,</l> +<l>Angustoque fretu rapidum, mare dividit undis</l> +<l>Æoliæ terrarum oras a finibus ejus:</l> +<l>Hîc est vasta Charybdis, et hîc Ætnæa minantur</l> +<l>Murmura, flammarum rursum se conligere iras,</l> +<l>Faucibus eruptos iterum ut vis evomat igneis,</l> +<l>Ad cœlumque ferat flammäi fulgura rursum.</l> +<l>Quæ, quum magna modis multis miranda videtur</l> +<l>Gentibus humanis regio, visundaque fertur,</l> +<l>Rebus opima bonis, multa munita virûm vi;</l> +<pb n="260"/><anchor id="Pg260"/><l>Nil tamen hoc habuisse viro præclarius in se,</l> +<l>Nec sanctum magis, et mirum, carumque, videtur.</l> +<l>Carmina quin etiam divini pectoris ejus</l> +<l>Vociferantur, et exponunt præclara reperta;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ut vix humana videatur stirpe creatus.</q>—Lib. I. 717.</l> +</lg> + +<p> +It was formerly mentioned, that Ennius had translated into +Latin verse the Greek poem of Epicharmus, which, from the +fragments preserved, appears to have contained many speculations +with regard to the productive elements of which the +world is composed, as also concerning the preservative powers +of nature. To the works of Ennius our poet seems to have +been indebted, partly as a model for enriching the still scanty +Latin language with new terms, and partly as a treasury or +storehouse of words already provided. Him, too, he celebrates +with the most ardent and unfeigned enthusiasm:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Ennius ut noster cecinit, qui primus amæno</q></l> +<l>Detulit ex Helicone perenni fronde coronam,</l> +<l>Per genteis Italas hominum quæ clara clueret.</l> +<l>Et si præterea tamen esse Acherusia templa</l> +<l>Ennius æternis exponit versibus edens;</l> +<l>Quo neque permanent animæ, neque corpora nostra;</l> +<l>Sed quædam simulacra modis pallentia miris;</l> +<l>Unde, sibi exortam, semper florentis Homeri</l> +<l>Commemorat speciem, lacrumas et fundere salsas</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Cœpisse, et <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">rerum naturam</hi> expandere dictis.</q>—I. 122.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These writers, Empedocles and Ennius, were probably +Lucretius’ chief guides; and though the most original of the +Latin poets, many of his finest passages may be traced to the +Greeks. The beautiful lamentation,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nam jam non domus accipiet te læta, neque uxor</q></l> +<l>Optuma, nec dulceis occurrent oscula nati </l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Præripere, et tacitâ pectus dulcedine tangunt,</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +is said to be translated from a dirge chaunted at Athenian +funerals; and the passage where he represents the feigned +tortures of hell as but the workings of a guilty and unquiet +spirit, is versified from an oration of Æschines against Timarchus. +</p> + +<p> +In the first and second books, Lucretius chiefly expounds +the cosmogony, or physical part of his system—a system +which had been originally founded by Leucippus, a philosopher +of the Eleatic sect, and, from his time, had been +successively improved by Democritus and Epicurus. He +establishes in these books his two great principles,—that +nothing can be made from nothing, and that nothing can ever +be annihilated or return to nothing; and, that there is in the +universe a void or space, in which atoms interact. These +<pb n="261"/><anchor id="Pg261"/>atoms he believes to be the original component parts of all +matter, as well as of animal life; and the arrangement of +such corpuscles occasions, according to him, the whole difference +in substances. +</p> + +<p> +It cannot be denied, that in these two books particularly, +(but the observation is in some degree applicable to the whole +poem,) there are many barren tracts—many physiological, +meteorological, and geological details—which are at once +too incorrect for the philosophical, and too dry and abstract +for the poetical reader. It is wonderful, however, how Lucretius +contrives, by the beauty of his images, to give a picturesque +colouring and illustration to the most unpromising +topics. Near the beginning of his poem, for example, in +attempting to prove a very abstract proposition, he says,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Præterea, quur vere rosam, frumenta calore,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Viteis auctumno fondi suadente videmus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Thus, by the introduction of the rose and vines, bestowing a +fragrance and freshness, and covering, as it were, with verdure, +the thorns and briars of abstract discussion. In like manner, +when contending that nothing utterly perishes, but merely +assumes another form, what a lovely rural landscape does he +present to the imagination! +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>—— <q rend="post: none">Pereunt imbres, ubi eos pater Æther</q></l> +<l>In gremium matris Terräi præcipitavit:</l> +<l>At nitidæ surgunt fruges, ramique virescunt</l> +<l>Arboribus; crescunt ipsæ, fœtuque gravantur.</l> +<l>Hinc alitur porro nostrum genus atque ferarum;</l> +<l><anchor id="corr261"/><corr sic="Hine">Hinc</corr> lætas urbeis puerûm florere videmus,</l> +<l>Frondiferasque novis avibus canere undique sylvas;</l> +<l>Hinc, fessæ pecudes, pingues per pabula læta,</l> +<l>Corpora deponunt, et candens lacteus humor</l> +<l>Uberibus manat distentis; hinc nova proles</l> +<l>Artubus infirmis teneras lasciva per herbas</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ludit, lacte mero menteis percussa novellas.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<q>Whoever,</q> says Warton, <q rend="post: none">imagines, with Tully, that +Lucretius had not a great genius<note place="foot"><q>To those,</q> says Warton, (<hi rend="italic">Essay on the Writings and Genius of Pope</hi>, +Vol. II. p. 402, note), <q>that know the number of thoughts that breathe, and words +that burn, in this animated writer, it seems surprising, that Tully could speak of him +in so cold and tasteless a manner.</q> The opinion of Cicero, however, has been +rendered unfavourable, only by the interpolation of the word <hi rend="italic">non</hi>, contrary to the +authority of all MSS. His words, in a letter to his brother Quintus, are <q>Lucretii +poemata ut scribis ita sunt; multis luminibus ingenii, multæ tamen artis. (Lib. II. +Epist. 11.)—The poems of Lucretius are as you write; with many beams of genius, +yet also with much art.</q></note>, is desired to cast his eye +on two pictures he has given us at the beginning of his poem,—the first, +of Venus with her lover Mars, beautiful to the last +<pb n="262"/><anchor id="Pg262"/>degree, and more glowing than any picture painted by Titian; +the second, of that terrible and gigantic figure the Demon of +Superstition, worthy the energetic pencil of Michael Angelo. +I am sure there is no piece by the hand of Guido, or the Carracci, +that exceeds the following group of allegorical personages:</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">It Ver, et Venus; et, veris prænuncius, ante</q></l> +<l>Pennatus graditur Zephyrus, vestigia propter,</l> +<l>Flora quibus Mater, præspargens ante viäi,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Cuncta coloribus egregiis et odoribus opplet.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In spite, however, of the powers of Lucretius, it was impossible, +from the very nature of his subject, but that some portions +would prove altogether unsusceptible of poetical embellishment. +Yet it may be doubted, whether these intractable +passages, by the charm of contrast, do not add, like deserts to +Oases in their bosom, an additional deliciousness in proportion +to their own sterility. The lovely group above-mentioned +by Warton, are clothed with additional beauty and enchantment, +from starting, as it were, like Armida and her Nymphs, +from the mossy rind of a rugged tree. The philosophical +analysis, too, employed by Lucretius, impresses the mind with +the conviction, that the poet is a profound thinker, and adds +great force to his moral reflections. Above all, his fearlessness, +if I may say so, produces this powerful effect. Dryden, +in a well-known passage, where he has most happily characterized +the general manner of Lucretius, observes, <q>If I am +not mistaken, the distinguishing character of Lucretius—I +mean, of his soul and genius—is a certain kind of noble pride, +and positive assertion of his own opinions. He is everywhere +confident of his own reason, and assuming an absolute command, +not only over his vulgar readers, but even his patron, +Memmius.... This is that particular dictatorship which is +exercised by Lucretius; who, though often in the wrong, yet +seems to deal <hi rend="italic">bona fide</hi> with his reader, and tells him nothing +but what he thinks.... He seems to disdain all manner +of replies; and is so confident of his cause, that he is before-hand +with his antagonists, urging for them whatever he imagined +they could say, and leaving them, as he supposes, +without an objection for the future. All this, too, with so +much scorn and indignation, as if he were assured of the +triumph, and need only enter into the lists.</q> Hence while, +in other writers, the eulogy of virtue seems in some sort to +partake of the nature of a sermon—to be a conventional +language, and words of course—we listen to Lucretius as to +one who will fearlessly speak out; who had shut his ears to +<pb n="263"/><anchor id="Pg263"/>the murmurs of Acheron: and who, if he eulogizes Virtue, +extols her because her charms are real. How exquisite, for +example, and, at the same time, how powerful and convincing, +his delineation of the utter worthlessness of vanity and pomp, +contrasted with the pure and perfect delights of simple nature! +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Si non aurea sunt juvenum simulacra per ædes,</q></l> +<l>Lampadas igniferas manibus retinentia dextris,</l> +<l>Lumina nocturnis epulis ut suppeditentur,</l> +<l>Nec domus argento fulget auroque renidet,</l> +<l>Nec citharæ reboant laqueata aurataque tecta;</l> +<l>Quum tamen inter se, prostrati in gramine molli,</l> +<l>Propter aquæ rivum, sub ramis arboris altæ,</l> +<l>Non magnis opibus jucunde corpora curant:</l> +<l>Præsertim, quum tempestas arridet, et anni</l> +<l>Tempora conspargunt viridantes floribus herbas:</l> +<l>Nec calidæ citius decedunt corpore febres,</l> +<l>Textilibus si in picturis, ostroque rubenti,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Jaceris, quam si plebeiâ in veste cubandum <anchor id="corr263"/><corr sic="no quote">est.</corr></q>—II. 24.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The word <hi rend="italic">Præsertim</hi>, in this beautiful passage, affords an +illustration of what has been remarked above, that the kind of +philosophical analysis employed by Lucretius gives great +force to his moral reflections. He seems, as it were, to be +weighing his words; and, which is the only solid foundation +of just confidence, to be cautious of asserting anything which +experience would not fully confirm. One thing very remarkable +in this great poet is, the admirable clearness and closeness +of his reasoning. He repeatedly values himself not a little on +the circumstance, that, with an intractable subject, and a +language not yet accommodated to philosophical discussions, +and scanty in terms of physical as well as metaphysical +science, he was able to give so much clearness to his argument<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nec me animi fallit, Graiorum obscura reperta,</q></l> +<l>Difficile inlustrare Latinis versibus esse;</l> +<l>Multa novis verbis præsertim quum sit agendum,</l> +<l>Propter egestatem linguæ et rerum novitatem.</l> +<l> * * *</l> +<l>Deinde, quod obscurâ de re tam lucida pango</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Carmina, Musæo contingens cuncta lepore.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>; +which object it is generally admitted he has accomplished, +with little or no sacrifice of pure Latinity<note place="foot"><q>In Lucretio maxime puritas Latinæ linguæ, copiaque apparet.</q>—P. Victorius. +<hi rend="italic">Var. Lect.</hi> Lib. XVII. c. 16. <q>Lucretius Latinitatis author optimus.</q>—Casaubon, +<hi rend="italic">Not. in Johan.</hi> cap. 5.</note>. As a +proof at once of the perspicuity and closeness of his reasoning, +and the fertility of his mind in inventing arguments, there +might be given his long discussion, in the third book, on the +materiality of the human soul, and its incapability of surviving +the ruin of the corporeal frame. Never were the arguments +for materialism marshalled with such skill—never were the +<pb n="264"/><anchor id="Pg264"/>diseases of the mind, and the decay of memory and understanding, +so pathetically urged, so eloquently expressed. The +following quotation contains a specimen of the lucid and +logical reasoning of this philosophic poet; and the two first +verses, perhaps, after all that has been written, comprehend +the whole that is metaphysically or physiologically known +upon the subject: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Præterea, gigni pariter cum corpore, et unà</q></l> +<l>Crescere sentimus, pariterque senescere, mentem.</l> +<l>Nam, velut infirmo pueri, teneroque, vagantur</l> +<l>Corpore, sic animi sequitur sententia tenuis;</l> +<l>Inde, ubi robustis adolevit viribus ætas,</l> +<l>Consilium quoque majus, et auctior est animî vis.</l> +<l>Post, ubi jam validis quassatum est viribus ævi</l> +<l>Corpus, et obtusis ceciderunt viribus artus,</l> +<l>Claudicat ingenium, delirat linguaque mensque;</l> +<l>Omnia deficiunt, atque uno tempore desunt:</l> +<l>Ergo, dissolvi quoque convenit omnem animäi</l> +<l>Naturam, ceu fumus in altas aëris auras;</l> +<l>Quandoquidem gigni pariter, pariterque videmus</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Crescere; et, ut docui, simul, ævo fessa, fatisci.</q>—III. 446.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Lucretius having, by many arguments, endeavoured to +establish the mortality of the soul, proceeds to exhort against +a dread of death. The fear of that <q>last tremendous blow,</q> +appears to have harassed, and sometimes overwhelmed, the +minds of the Romans<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Who combats bravely, is not therefore brave;</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">He dreads a death-bed like a common slave.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>. To them, life presented a scene +of high duties and honourable labours; and they contemplated, +in a long futurity, the distant completion of their +serious and lofty aims. They were not yet habituated to +regard life as a banquet or recreation, from which they were +cheerfully to rise, in due time, sated with the feast prepared +for them; nor had they been accustomed to associate death +with those softening ideas of indolence and slumber, with +which it was the design of Lucretius to connect it. He +accordingly represents it as a privation of all sense,—as undisturbed +by tumult or terror, by grief or pain,—as a tranquil +sleep, and an everlasting repose. How sublime is the following +passage, in which, to illustrate his argument, that the long +night of the grave can be no more painful than the eternity +before our birth, he introduces the war with Carthage; and +what a picture does it convey of the energy and might of the +combatants! +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nil igitur Mors est, ad nos neque pertinet hilum,</q></l> +<l>Quandoquidem natura animi mortalis habetur.</l> +<pb n="265"/><anchor id="Pg265"/><l>Et, velut ante acto nil tempore sensimus ægrî,</l> +<l>Ad confligundum venientibus undique Pœnis;</l> +<l>Omnia quum, belli trepido concussa tumultu,</l> +<l>Horrida contremuere sub altis ætheris auris:</l> +<l>In dubioque fuere, utrorum ad regna cadundum</l> +<l>Omnibus humanis esset, terràque, màrique.</l> +<l>Sic, ubi non erimus, quum corporis atque animäi</l> +<l>Discidium fuerit, quibus e sumus uniter apti;</l> +<l>Scilicet haud nobis quidquam, qui non erimus tum,</l> +<l>Accidere omnino poterit, sensumque movere:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Non si terra mari miscebitur, et mare cœlo.</q>—III, 842.</l> +</lg> + +<p> +From this admirable passage till the close of the third book +there is an union of philosophy, of majesty, and pathos, which +hardly ever has been equalled. The incapacity of the highest +power and wisdom, as exhibited in so many instances, to +exempt from the common lot of man, the farewell which we +must bid to the sweetest domestic enjoyments, and the magnificent +<hi rend="italic">prosopopœia</hi> of Nature to her children, rebuking their +regrets, and the injustice of their complaints, are altogether +exceedingly solemn, and affecting, and sublime. +</p> + +<p> +The two leading tenets of Epicurus concerning the formation +of the world and the mortality of the soul, are established +by Lucretius in the first three books. A great proportion of +the fourth book may be considered as episodical. Having +explained the nature of primordial atoms, and of the soul, +which is formed from the finest of them, he announces, that +there are certain images (<hi rend="italic">rerum simulacra</hi>,) or effluvia, which +are constantly thrown off from the surface of whatever exists. +On this hypothesis he accounts for all our external senses; +and he applies it also to the theory of dreams, in which whatever +images have amused the senses during day most readily +recur. Mankind being prone to love, of all the phantoms +which rush on our imagination during night, none return so +frequently as the forms of the fair. This leads Lucretius to +enlarge on the mischievous effects of illicit love; and nothing +can be finer than the various moral considerations which he +enforces, to warn us against the snares of guilty passion. It +must, however, be confessed, that his description of what he +seems to consider as the physical evils and imperfect fruition +of sensual love, forms the most glowing picture ever presented +of its delights. But he has atoned for his violation of decorum, +by a few beautiful lines on connubial happiness at the +conclusion of the book: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Nam facit ipsa suis interdum femina factis,</q></l> +<l>Morigerisque modis et mundo corpore culta,</l> +<l>Ut facile assuescat secum vir degere vitam.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Quod super est, consuetudo concinnat amorem;</l> +<l>Nam, leviter quamvis, quod crebro tunditur ictu,</l> +<pb n="266"/><anchor id="Pg266"/><l>Vincitur id longo spatio tamen, atque labascit:</l> +<l>Nonne vides, etiam guttas, in saxa cadenteis,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Humoris longo in spacio pertundere saxa?</q>—IV. 1273.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The principal subject of the fifth book—a composition +unrivalled in energy and richness of language, in full and +genuine sublimity—is the origin and laws of the visible world, +with those of its inhabitants. The poet presents us with a +grand picture of Chaos, and the most magnificent account of +the creation that ever flowed from human pen. In his representation +of primeval life and manners, he exhibits the discomfort +of this early stage of society by a single passage of +most wild and powerful imagery,—in which he describes a +savage, in the early ages of the world, when men were yet +contending with beasts for possession of the earth, flying +through the woods, with loud shrieks, in a stormy night, from +the pursuit of some ravenous animal, which had invaded +the cavern where he sought a temporary shelter and repose: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 10">—— <q rend="post: none">Sæcla ferarum</q></l> +<l>Infestam miseris faciebant sæpe quietem;</l> +<l>Ejecteique domo, fugiebant saxea tecta</l> +<l>Setigeri suis adventu, validique leonis;</l> +<l>Atque intempestâ cedebant nocte, paventes,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Hospitibus sævis instrata cubilia fronde.</q>—V. 980.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +One is naturally led to compare the whole of Lucretius’ +description of primeval society, and the origin of man, with +Ovid’s <hi rend="italic">Four Ages of the World</hi>, which commence his <hi rend="italic">Metamorphoses</hi>, +and which, philosophically considered, certainly +exhibit the most wonderful of all metamorphoses. In his +sketch of the Golden Age, he has selected the favourable circumstances +alluded to by Lucretius—exemption from war and +sea voyages, and spontaneous production of fruits by the earth. +There is also a beautiful view of early life and manners in one +of the elegies of Tibullus<note place="foot">Lib. I. El. iii. v. 37.</note>; and Thomson, in his picture of +what he calls the <q>prime of days,</q> has combined the descriptions +of Ovid and the elegiac bard. Most of the poets, however, +who have painted the Golden Age, and Ovid in particular, +have represented mankind as growing more vicious and +unhappy with advance of time—Lucretius, more philosophically, +as constantly improving. He has fixed on connubial +love as the first great softener of the human breast; and neither +Thomson nor Milton has described with more tenderness, +truth, and purity, the joys of domestic union. He follows the +progressive improvement of mankind occasioned by their +<pb n="267"/><anchor id="Pg267"/>subjection to the bonds of civil society and government; and +the book concludes with an account of the origin of the +fine arts, particularly music, in the course of which many +impressive descriptions occur, and many delicious scenes are +unfolded: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">At liquidas avium voces imitarier ore</q></l> +<l>Ante fuit multo, quam lævia carmina cantu</l> +<l>Concelebrare homines possent, aureisque juvare.</l> +<l>Et zephyri, cava per calamorum, sibila primum</l> +<l>Agrestes docuere cavas inflare cicutas.</l> +<l>Inde minutatim dulces didicere querelas</l> +<l>Tibia quas fundit, digitis pulsata canentûm,</l> +<l>Avia per nemora ac sylvas saltusque reperta,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Per loca pastorum deserta, atque otia dia.</q>—V. 1378.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In consequence of their ignorance and superstitions, the +Roman people were rendered perpetual slaves of the most +idle and unfounded terrors. In order to counteract these +popular prejudices, and to heal the constant disquietudes that +accompanied them, Lucretius proceeds, in the sixth book, to +account for a variety of extraordinary phænomena both in the +heavens and on the earth, which, at first view, seemed to deviate +from the usual laws of nature:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Sunt tempestates et fulmina clara canenda.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Having discussed the various theories formed to account for +electricity, water-spouts, hurricanes, the rainbow, and volcanoes, +he lastly considers the origin of pestilential and endemic +disorders. This introduces the celebrated account of the +plague, which ravaged Athens during the Peloponnesian war, +with which Lucretius concludes this book, and his magnificent +poem. <q>In this narrative,</q> says a late translator of Lucretius, +<q>the true genius of poetry is perhaps more powerfully and +triumphantly exhibited than in any other poem that was ever +written. Lucretius has ventured upon one of the most uncouth +and repressing subjects to the muses that can possibly +be brought forward—the history and symptoms of a disease, +and this disease accompanied with circumstances naturally the +most nauseating and indelicate. It was a subject altogether +new to numerical composition; and he had to strive with all +the pedantry of technical terms, and all the abstruseness of a +science in which he does not appear to have been professionally +initiated. He strove, however, and he conquered. In +language the most captivating and nervous, and with ideas +the most precise and appropriate, he has given us the entire +history of this tremendous pestilence. There is not, perhaps, +<pb n="268"/><anchor id="Pg268"/>a symptom omitted, yet there is not a verse with which the +most scrupulous can be offended. The description of the +symptoms, and also the various circumstances of horror and +distress attending this dreadful scourge, have been derived +from Thucydides, who furnished the facts with great accuracy, +having been himself a spectator and a sufferer under this +calamity. His narrative is esteemed an elaborate and complete +performance; and to the faithful yet elegant detail of +the Greek historian, the Roman bard has added all that was +necessary to convert the description into poetry.</q> +</p> + +<p> +In the whole history of Roman taste and criticism, nothing +appears to us so extraordinary as the slight mention that is +made of Lucretius by succeeding Latin authors; and, when +mentioned, the coldness with which he is spoken of by all +Roman critics and poets, with the exception of Ovid. Perhaps +the spirit of free-thinking which pervaded his writings, +rendered it unsuitable or unsafe to extol even his poetical +talents. There was a time, when, in this country, it was +thought scarcely decorous or becoming to express high admiration +of the genius of Rousseau or Voltaire. +</p> + +<p> +The doctrines of Lucretius, particularly that which impugns +the superintending care of Providence, were first formally +opposed by the Stoic Manilius in his Astronomic poem. +In modern times, his whole philosophical system has been +refuted in the long and elaborate poem of the Cardinal Polignac, +entitled, <hi rend="italic">Anti-Lucretius, sive de Deo et Natura</hi>. This +enormous work, though incomplete, consists of nine books, +of about 1300 lines each, and the whole is addressed to Quintius, +an atheist, who corresponds to the Lorenzo of the <hi rend="italic">Night +Thoughts</hi>. Descartes is the Epicurus of the poem, and the +subject of many heavy panegyrics. In the philosophical part +of his subject, the Cardinal has sometimes refuted, at too +great length, propositions which are manifestly absurd—at +others, he has impugned demonstrated truths—and the moral +system of Lucretius he throughout has grossly misunderstood. +But he has rendered ample justice to his poetical merit; and, +in giving a compendium of the subject of his great antagonist’s +poem, he has caught some share of the poetical spirit +with which his predecessor was inspired:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Hic agitare velit Cytheriam inglorius artem:</q></l> +<l>Hic myrtum floresque legat, quos tinxit Adonis</l> +<l>Sanguine, dilectus Veneri puer; aut Heliconem,</l> +<l>Et colles Baccho, partim, Phœboque sacratos</l> +<l>Incolat. Hic, placidi latebris in mollibus antri,</l> +<l>Silenum recubantem, et amico nectare venas</l> +<l>Inflatum stupeat titubanti voce canentem;</l> +<l>Et juvenum cæcos ignes, et vulnera dicat,</l> +<pb n="269"/><anchor id="Pg269"/><l>Et vacuæ, pulsis terroribus, otia vitæ,</l> +<l>Fœcundosque greges, et amæni gaudia ruris:</l> +<l>Hæc et plura canens, avidè bibat ore diserto</l> +<l>Pegaseos latices; et nomen grande Poetæ,</l> +<l>Non Sapientis, amet. Lauro insignire poetam</l> +<l>Quis dubitet? Primus viridanteis ipse coronas</l> +<l>Imponam capiti, et meritas pro carmine laudes</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ante alios dicam.</q> ——<note place="foot">Lib. V. 24.</note></l> +</lg> + +<p> +Entertaining this just admiration of his opponent, the Cardinal +has been studious, while refuting his principles, to imitate +as closely as possible the poetic style of Lucretius; and, +accordingly, we find many noble and beautiful passages interspersed +amid the dry discussions of the <hi rend="italic">Anti-Lucretius</hi>. In +the first book, there is an elegant comparison, something like +that by Wolsey in <hi rend="italic">Henry VIII.</hi>, of a man who had wantoned +in the sunshine of prosperity, and was unprepared for the +storms of adversity, to the tender buds of the fruit-tree blighted +by the north-wind. The whole poem, indeed, is full of +many beautiful and appropriate similes. I have not room to +transcribe them, but may refer the reader to those in the first +book, of a sick man turning to every side for rest, to a traveller +following an <hi rend="italic">ignis fatuus</hi>; in the second, motes dancing +in the sun-beam to the atoms of Epicurus floating in the +immensity of space; in the third, the whole philosophy of +Epicurus to the infinite variety of splendid but fallacious +appearances produced by the shifting of scenery in our theatres, +(line 90,) and the identity of matter amid the various +shapes it assumes, to the transformations of <hi rend="italic">Proteus</hi>. The +fourth book commences with a beautiful image of a traveller +on a steep, looking back on his journey; immediately followed +by a fine picture of the unhallowed triumph of Epicurus, +and Religion weeping during the festival of youths to his +honour. In the same book, there is a noble description of +the river Anio, (line 1459,) and a comparison of the rising of +sap in trees during spring to a fountain playing and falling +back on itself (780–845). We have in the fifth book a beautiful +argument, that the soul is not to be thought material, +because affected by the body, illustrated by musical instruments +(745). In the sixth book there occurs a charming +description of the sensitive plant; and, finally, of a bird singing +to his mate, to solace her while brooding over her +young:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Haud secus in sylvis, ac frondes inter opacas,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ingenitum carmen modulatur musicus ales,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="270"/><anchor id="Pg270"/> + +<p> +Almost all modern didactic poems, whether treating of +theology or physics, are composed in obvious imitation of the +style and manner of Lucretius. The poem of Aonius Palearius, +<hi rend="italic">De Animi Immortalitate</hi>, though written in contradiction to +the system of Lucretius, concerning the mortality of the soul, +is almost a <hi rend="italic">cento</hi> made up from lines or half lines of the Roman +bard; and the same may be said of that extensive class of +Latin poems, in which the French Jesuits of the seventeenth +century have illustrated the various phænomena of nature<note place="foot">C. Nocet, <hi rend="italic">Iris</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Aurora Borealis</hi>—Le Febre, <hi rend="italic">Terræ Motus</hi>—Souciet, +<hi rend="italic">Cometæ</hi>—Malapertus, <hi rend="italic">De Ventis</hi>. These, and many other poems of a similar description, +are published in the <hi rend="italic">Poemata Didascalica</hi>. 3 Tom. Paris, 1813.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Others have attempted to explain the philosophy of Newton +in Latin verse; but the Newtonian system is better calculated +to be demonstrated than sung— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ornari res ipsa negat—contenta doceri.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It is a philosophy founded on the most sublime calculations; and +it is in other lines and numbers than those of poetry, that the +book of nature must now be written. If we attempt to express +arithmetical or algebraical figures in verse, circumlocution is +always required; more frequently they cannot be expressed at +all; and if they could, the lines would have no advantage over +prose: nay, would have considerable disadvantage, from obscurity +and prolixity. All this is fully confirmed by an examination +of the writings of those who have attempted to embellish +the sublime system of Newton with the charms of poetry. +If we look, for example, into the poem of Boscovich on +Eclipses, or still more, into the work of Benedict Stay, we +shall see, notwithstanding the advantage they possessed of +writing in a language so flexible as the Latin, and so capable +of inversion, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 14"><q rend="post: none">The shifts and turns,</q></l> +<l>The expedients and inventions multiform,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">To which the mind resorts in search of terms<note place="foot">Cowper.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The latter of these writers employs 36 lines in expressing the +law of Kepler, <q>that the squares of the periodical times of the +revolutions of the planets, are as the cubes of their mean distances +from the sun.</q> These lines, too, which are considered +by Stay himself, and by Boscovich, his annotator, as the triumph +of the philosophic muse, are so obscure as to need a long commentary. +Indeed, the poems of both these eminent men consist +of a string of enigmas, whereas the principal and almost +<pb n="271"/><anchor id="Pg271"/>only ornament of philosophy is perspicuity. After all, only +what are called the round numbers can be expressed in verse, +and this is necessarily done in a manner so obscure and perplexed +as ever to need a prose explanation. +</p> + +<p> +With Lucretius and his subject it was totally the reverse. +From the incorrectness of his philosophical views, or rather +those of his age, much of his labour has been employed, so to +speak, in embodying straws in amber. Yet, with all its defects, +this ancient philosophy, if it deserve the name, had the advantage, +that its indefinite nature rendered it highly susceptible +of an embellishment, which can never be bestowed on a more +precise and accurate system. Hence, perhaps, it may be +safely foretold, that the philosophical poem of Lucretius will +remain unrivalled; and also, that the prediction of Ovid concerning +it will be verified— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q rend="post: none">Carmina sublimis, tunc sunt peritura Lucretî</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="pre: none">Exitio terras cum dabit una dies.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The refutations and imitations of Lucretius, contained in +modern didactic poems, have led me away from what may +be considered as my proper subject, and I therefore return +to those poets who were coeval with that author, with whose +works we have been so long occupied. Of these the most distinguished +was +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Caius Valerius Catullus"/><index index="pdf" level1="Caius Valerius Catullus"/> +<head>CAIUS VALERIUS CATULLUS,</head> + +<p> +who was nearly contemporary with Lucretius, having come +into the world a few years after him, and having survived him +but a short period. +</p> + +<p> +In every part of our survey of Latin Literature, we have +had occasion to remark the imitative spirit of Roman poetry, +and the constant analogy and resemblance of all the productions +of the Latian muse to some Greek original. None of +his poetical predecessors was more versed in Greek literature +than Catullus; and his extensive knowledge of its beauties +procured for him the appellation of <hi rend="italic">Doctus</hi><note place="foot">Barthii <hi rend="italic">Adversaria</hi>, l. 38. c. 7. Funccius, <hi rend="italic">de Virili Ætate, Ling. Lat.</hi> c. 3. +Some critics, however, are of opinion that he was called Doctus from the correctness +and purity of his Latin style. <q>Latinæ puritatis custos fuit religiosissimus, unde et +<hi rend="italic">docti</hi> cognomen meruit.</q> (Car. Stephen.) Müller, a German writer, has a notable +conjecture on this subject. He says, we will come nearest the truth, if we suppose +that Ovid, while mentioning Catullus, applied to him the epithet <hi rend="italic">doctus</hi> merely to +fill up the measure of a line, and that his successors took up the appellation on trust.—(<hi rend="italic">Einleit. +zur Kenntniss der Lateinisch. Schriftsteller</hi>, T. II. p. 265.) Mr +Elton thinks that the epithet did not mean what we understand by learned, but +rather knowing and accomplished—what the old English authors signify by cunning, +as cunning in music and the mathematics.—(<hi rend="italic">Specimens of the Classics</hi>.) This +conjecture seems to be in some measure confirmed by Horace’s application of the +term <hi rend="italic">doctus</hi> to the actor Roscius:— + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quæ gravis Æsopus, quæ doctus Roscius egit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +The recent translator of Catullus conceives that the title of learned never belonged +peculiarly to him, but was merely conferred on him in common with all poets, as it +is now bestowed on all lawyers.</note>. He translated +<pb n="272"/><anchor id="Pg272"/>many of the shorter and more delicate pieces of the Greeks; +an attempt which hitherto had been thought impossible, +though the broad humour of their comedies, the vehement +pathos of their tragedies, and the romantic interest of the +Odyssey, had stood the transformation. His stay in Bithynia, +though little advantageous to his fortune, rendered him better +acquainted than he might otherwise have been with the +productions of Greece, and he was therefore, in a great +degree, indebted to this expedition (on which he always +appears to have looked back with mortification and disappointment) +for those felicitous turns of expression, that grace, +simplicity, and purity, which are the characteristics of his +poems, and of which hitherto Greece alone had afforded +models. Indeed, in all his verses, whether elegiac or heroic, +we perceive his imitation of the Greeks, and it must be +admitted that he has drawn from them his choicest stores. +His Hellenisms are frequent—his images, similes, metaphors, +and addresses to himself, are all Greek; and even in the +versification of his odes we see visible traces of their origin. +Nevertheless, he was the founder of a new school of <hi rend="italic">Latin</hi> +poetry; and as he was the first who used such variety of +measures, and perhaps himself invented some<note place="foot"><p>Catullus, in his miscellaneous poems, has employed not fewer than thirteen +different sorts of versification. +</p> + +<p> +1. That which is most frequently used is the Phalæcian hendecasyllable, consisting +of a spondee, dactyl, and three trochees. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Cui do | no lepi | dum no | vum li | bellum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This sort of measure has been adopted by Catullus in thirty-nine poems. +</p> + +<p> +2. Trimeter iambus, consisting of six feet, which are generally all iambuses. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ait | fuis | se na | vium | celer | rimus;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +but a spondee sometimes forms the first, third, and fifth feet. Four poems are in +this measure—the fourth, twentieth, twenty-ninth, and fifty-second. +</p> + +<p> +3. Choliambus or scazon, which is the same with the last mentioned, except that +the concluding foot of the line is always a spondee. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Fulse | re quon | dam can | didi | tibi | soles.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This metre is used seven times, being employed in the eighth, twenty-second, +thirty-first, thirty-seventh, thirty-ninth, forty-fourth, and fifty-ninth poems. +</p> + +<p> +4. Trochaic Stesichian, consisting of six feet—choreus or spondee, a dactyl, a +cretic, a choreus or spondee, a dactyl, and lastly a choreus. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Alter | parva fe | rens manu | semper | munera | larga.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This measure appears only in the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth poems.</p> +<p> +5. Iambic tetrameter catalectic, formed of seven feet and a cæsura at the close of +the line. It occurs in the twenty-fifth poem. +</p> + +<p> +6. Choriambus. This also is employed but once, being used only in the thirtieth. +It consists of five feet,—a spondee, three choriambi, and a pyrrhichius. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ventos | irrita fer | et nebulas | aerias | sinis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +7. A sort of Phalæcian, consisting of two spondees and three chorei. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Quas vul | tu vi | di ta | men se | reno.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But it sometimes consists of a spondee and four chorei. This measure is adopted +in some lines of the fifty-fifth ode. +</p> + +<p> +8. Glyconian, generally made up of a spondee and two dactyles. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Jam ser | vire Tha | lassio.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +but sometimes of a trochæus and two dactyles. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Cinge | tempora | floribus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This sort of verse occurs, but mixed with other measures in the thirty-fourth ode, +addressed to Diana, and also in the sixtieth. +</p> + +<p> +9. Pherecratian, consisting of three feet, a trochee, spondee, or iambus in the +first place, followed by a dactyl and spondee. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>Exer | ceto ju | ventam</l> +<l>Frige | rans Aga | nippe</l> +<l>Hymen | O Hyme | næe.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This is used in the thirty-fourth and sixtieth, mingled with glyconian verse. +</p> + +<p> +<anchor id="corr273"/><corr sic="16.">10.</corr> Galliambic. This is employed only in the poem of Atys, which indeed is the +sole specimen of the galliambic measure, in the Latin language. It consists of six +feet, which are used very loosely and indiscriminately. The first seems to be at +pleasure, an anapæst, spondee, or tribrachys; second, an iambus, tribrachys, or +dactyl; third, iambus or spondee; fourth, dactyl or spondee; fifth, a dactyl, or various +other feet; sixth, generally an anapæst, but sometimes an iambus. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Super alta vectus Atys celeri rate maria.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The remaining three species of measure employed by Catullus, are the sapphic +stanza, used in the seventh and fifty-first odes; the hexameter lines, which we have +in the epithalamium of <hi rend="italic">Peleus</hi> and <hi rend="italic">Thetis</hi>; and the pentameter lines, used alternately +with the hexameters, and thereby constituting elegiac verse, which is employed +in all the elegies of Catullus. Of these three measures, the structure is well +known.—(Vulpius, <hi rend="italic">Diatribe de Metris Catulli</hi>.)</p></note>, he was amply +<pb n="273"/><anchor id="Pg273"/>entitled to call the poetical volume which he presented to +Cornelius Nepos, <hi rend="italic">Lepidum Novum Libellum</hi>. The beautiful +expressions, too, and idioms of the Greek language, which he +has so carefully selected, are woven with such art into the +texture of his composition, and so aptly figure the impassioned +ideas of his amorous muse, that they have all the fresh and +untarnished hues of originality. +</p> + +<p> +This elegant poet was born of respectable parents, in the +territory of Verona, but whether at the town so called, or on +the peninsula of Sirmio, which projects into the Lake Benacus, +has been a subject of much controversy. The former opinion +has been maintained by Maffei and Bayle<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Verona Illustrata</hi>, Parte II. c. 1. <hi rend="italic">Dict. Hist. Art. Catullus</hi>.</note>, and the latter by +Gyraldus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Poet.</hi> Dial. x.</note>, Schoell<note place="foot">Schoell, <hi rend="italic">Hist. Abreg. de la Litt. Rom.</hi> T. I. p. 310.</note>, Fuhrmann<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Handbuch der Classischen Litt.</hi> T. I. p. 187.</note>, and most modern writers. +</p> + +<pb n="274"/><anchor id="Pg274"/> + +<p> +The precise period, as well as place, of the birth of Catullus, +is a topic of debate and uncertainty. According to the +Eusebian Chronicle, he was born in 666, but, according to +other authorities, in 667<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Saxii Onomasticon</hi>, T. I. p. 148.</note> or 668. In consequence of an invitation +from Manlius Torquatus, one of the noblest patricians +of the state, he proceeded in early youth to Rome, where he +appears to have kept but indifferent company, at least in point +of moral character. He impaired his fortune so much by +extravagance, that he had no one, as he complains, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Fractum qui veteris pedem grabati</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">In collo sibi collocare possit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This, however, must partly have been written in jest, as his +finances were always sufficient to allow him to keep up a +delicious villa, on the peninsula of Sirmio, and an expensive +residence at Tibur. With a view of improving his pecuniary +circumstances, he adopted the usual Roman mode of re-establishing +a diminished fortune, and accompanied Caius Memmius, +the celebrated patron of Lucretius, to Bithynia, when +he was appointed Prætor of that province. His situation, +however, was but little meliorated by this expedition, and, +in the course of it, he lost a beloved brother, who was +along with him, and whose death he has lamented in verses +never surpassed in delicacy or pathos. He came back to +Rome with a shattered constitution, and a lacerated heart. +From the period of his return to Italy till his decease, his time +appears to have been chiefly occupied with the prosecution +of licentious amours, in the capital or among the solitudes of +Sirmio. The Eusebian Chronicle places his death in 696, +and some writers fix it in 705. It is evident, however, that +he must have survived at least till 708, as Cicero, in his Letters, +talks of his verses against Cæsar and Mamurra as newly +written, and first seen by Cæsar in that year<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ep. ad Att.</hi> XIII. 52.</note>. The distracted +and unhappy state of his country, and his disgust at the treatment +which he had received from Memmius, were perhaps +sufficient excuse for shunning political employments<note place="foot"> +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>O blame not the bard, if he fly to the bowers,</l> +<l>Where Pleasure lies carelessly smiling at Fame;</l> +<l>He was born for much more, and in happier hours</l> +<l>His soul might have glowed with a holier flame.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 16"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Moore.</hi></l> +</lg> +</note>; but +when we consider his taste and genius, we cannot help regretting +that he was merely an idler, and a debauchee. He loved +Clodia, (supposed to have been the sister of the infamous +Clodius,) a beautiful but shameless woman, whom he has +<pb n="275"/><anchor id="Pg275"/>celebrated under the name of Lesbia<note place="foot">Apuleius, <hi rend="italic">In Apologia</hi>.</note>, as comparing her to +the Lesbian Sappho, her prototype in total abandonment to +guilty love. He also numbered among his mistresses, Hypsithilla +and Aufilena, ladies of Verona. Among his friends, he +ranked not only most men of pleasure and fashion in Rome, +but many of her eminent literary and political characters, as +Cornelius Nepos, Cicero, and Asinius Pollio. His enmities +seem to have been as numerous as his loves or friendships, +and competition in poetry, or rivalship in gallantry, appears +always to have been a sufficient cause for his dislike; and +where an antipathy was once conceived, he was unable to put +any restraint on the expression of his hostile feelings. His +poems are chiefly employed in the indulgence and commemoration +of these various passions. They are now given to us +without any order or attempt at arrangement: They were +distributed, indeed, by Petrus Crinitus, into three classes, +lyric, elegiac, and epigrammatic,—a division which has been +adopted in a few of the earlier editions; but there is no such +separation in the best MSS., nor is it probable that they were +originally thus classed by the author, as he calls his book +<hi rend="italic">Libellum Singularem</hi>; and they cannot now be conveniently +reduced under these heads, since several poems, as the nuptials +of Peleus and Thetis, are written in hexameter measure. To +others, which may be termed occasional poems expressing to +his friends a simple idea, or relating the occurrences of the +day, in iambic or phalangian verse, it would be difficult to +assign any place in a systematic arrangement. Under what +class, for instance, could we bring the poem giving a detail +of his visit to the house of the courtezan, and the conversation +which passed there concerning Bithynia? The order, therefore, +in which the poems have been arbitrarily placed by the +latest editors and commentators, however immethodical, is the +only one which can be followed, in giving an account of the +miscellaneous productions of Catullus. +</p> + +<p> +1. Is a modest and not inelegant dedication, by the poet, of +the whole volume, to Cornelius Nepos, whom he compliments +on having written a general history, in three books, an undertaking +which had not previously been attempted by any +Roman— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Ausus es unus Italorum</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Omne ævum tribus explicare chartis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +2. <hi rend="italic">Ad Passerem Lesbiæ</hi>. This address of Catullus to the +favourite sparrow of his mistress, Lesbia, is well known, and, +<pb n="276"/><anchor id="Pg276"/>has been always celebrated as a model of grace and elegance. +Politian<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Centur. Miscell.</hi> I. c. 6.</note>, Turnebus, and others, have discovered in this little +poem an allegorical signification, which idea has been founded +on a line in an epigram of Martial, <hi rend="italic">Ad Romam et Dindymum</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quæ si tot fuerint, quot ille dixit,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><hi rend="italic">Donabo tibi passerem Catulli</hi><note place="foot">Lib. XI. Ep. 7.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +That by the <hi rend="italic">passer Catulli</hi>, however, Martial meant nothing +more than an agreeable little epigram, in the style of Catullus, +which he would address to Dindymus as his reward, is evident +from another epigram, where it is obviously used in this +sense— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Sic forsan tener ausus est Catullus</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Magno mittere passerem Maroni<note place="foot">Lib. IV. Ep. 14.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and also from that in which he compares a favourite whelp of +Publius to the sparrow of Lesbia<note place="foot">Lib. I. Ep. 110.</note>. That a real and <hi rend="italic">feathered</hi> +sparrow was in the view of Catullus, is also evinced by the following +ode, in which he laments the death of this favourite of +his mistress. The erroneous notion taken up by Politian, has +been happily enough ridiculed by Sannazzarius, in an epigram +entitled <hi rend="italic">Ad Pulicianum</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>At nescio quis Pulicianus,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and Muretus expresses his astonishment, that the most grave +and learned Benedictus Lampridius should have made this +happy interpretation by Politian the theme of his <hi rend="italic">constant</hi> +conversation, <q>Hanc Politiani sententiam in <hi rend="italic">omni</hi> sermone +approbare solitum fuisse<note place="foot">Muret. <hi rend="italic">in Catull. Comment.</hi></note>.</q> Why Lesbia preferred a sparrow +to other birds, I know not, unless it was for those qualities +which induced the widow of the Emperor Sigismond to esteem +it more than the turtle-dove<note place="foot">Bayle, <hi rend="italic">Dict. Hist.</hi> Art. + <hi rend="italic">Barbara</hi>.</note>, and which so much excited +the envy of the learned Scioppius, at Ingolstadt. +</p> + +<p> +3. <hi rend="italic">Luctus in morte Passeris</hi>. A lamentation for the death +of the same sparrow— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Qui nunc it per iter tenebricosum,</q></l> +<l>Illuc unde negant redire quemquam:</l> +<l>At vobis male sit, malæ tenebræ</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Orci, quæ omnia bella devoratis.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The idea in this last line was probably taken from Bion’s +<pb n="277"/><anchor id="Pg277"/>celebrated <hi rend="italic">Idyllium</hi>—the lamentation of Venus for the death +of Adonis, where there is a similar complaint of the unrelenting +Orcus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Το δε παν καλον ἐς σε καταῥρει</foreign><!--[Greek: To de pan kalon es se katarrei]-->.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This poem on the death of Lesbia’s sparrow has suggested +many similar productions. Ovid’s elegy, <hi rend="italic">In Mortem Psittaci</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Amor.</hi> Lib. II. eleg. 6.</note>, +where he extols and laments the favourite parrot of his mistress, +Corinna, is a production of the same description; but it +has not so much delicacy, lightness, and felicity of expression. +It differs from it too, by directing the attention chiefly to the +parrot, whereas Catullus fixes it more on the lady, who had +been deprived of her favourite. Statius also has a poem on +the death of a parrot, entitled <hi rend="italic">Psittacus Melioris</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Sylv.</hi> II. 3.</note>; and Lotichius, +a celebrated Latin poet, who flourished in Germany +about the middle of the 16th century, has, in his elegies, a +similar production on the death of a dolphin<note place="foot">Lib. II. eleg. 7.</note>. Naugerius, <hi rend="italic">In +Obitum Borgetti Catuli</hi>, nearly copies the poem of Catullus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nunc raptus rapido maloque fato,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ad manes abiit tenebricosas,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It has been imitated closely, and with application to a sparrow, +by Corrozet, Durant, and Monnoye, French poets of the 16th +century—by Gacon and Richer, in the beginning, and R. de +Juvigny, in the end, of the 18th century. In all these imitations, +the idea of a departure to regions of darkness, whence +no one returns, is faithfully preserved. Most of them are +written with much grace and elegance; and this, indeed, is a +sort of poetry in which the French remarkably excel. +</p> + +<p> +4. <hi rend="italic">Dedicatio Phaseli</hi>. This is the consecration to Castor +and Pollux, of the vessel which brought the poet safe from +Bithynia to the shores of Italy. By a figure, daring even in +verse, he represents the ship as extolling its high services, and +claiming its well-earned dedication to Castor and Pollux, gods +propitious to mariners. From this poem we may trace the +progress of Catullus’s voyage: It would appear that he had +embarked from Pontus, and having coasted Thrace, sailed +through the Archipelago, and then into the Adriatic, whence +the vessel had been brought probably up the course of the Po, +and one of its branches, to the vicinity of Sirmio. +</p> + +<p> +There have been nearly as many parodies of this poem, as +<pb n="278"/><anchor id="Pg278"/>imitations of that last mentioned. The collector of the <hi rend="italic">Catalecta +Virgilii</hi>, has attributed to Virgil a satire on Ventidius, +(under the name of Sabinus,) who, from a muleteer, became +consul, in the reign of Augustus, and which is parodied from +Catullus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Sabinus ille quem videtis hospites,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Another parody is a Latin poem, entitled <hi rend="italic">Lycoris</hi>, by +Adrien Valois, published at the end of the <hi rend="italic">Valesiana</hi>, where +a courtezan, retired from the world, is introduced, boasting +of the various intrigues of her former life. Nicol Heinelius published +not less than fifty parodies of this poem, in a small book +entitled <q>Phaselus Catulli, et ad <anchor id="corr278"/><corr sic="eumdem">eundem</corr> Parodiarum a diversis +auctoribus scriptarum decades quinque; ex Bibliotheca +Nic. Heinelii, Jurisconsulti, Lips. 1642.</q> Scaliger has also +translated the <hi rend="italic">Phaselus</hi> of Catullus into Greek iambics. +</p> + +<p> +5. <hi rend="italic">Ad Lesbiam</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus,</q></l> +<l>Rumoresque senum severiorum</l> +<l>Omnes unius æstimemus assis.</l> +<l>Soles occidere et redire possunt:</l> +<l>Nobis, cum semel occidit brevis lux,</l> +<l>Nox est perpetua una dormienda.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Da mihi basia mille, deinde centum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This sentiment, representing either the pleasure of conviviality, +or delights of love, (and much more so as when here +united,) in contrast with the gloom of death, possesses something +exquisitely tender and affecting. The picture of joy, +with Death in the distance, inspires a feeling of pensive morality, +adding a charm to the gayest scenes of life, as the +transientness of the rose enhances our sense of its beauty and +fragrance; and as the cloud, which throws a shade over the +horizon, sometimes softens and mellows the prospect. This +opposition of images succeeds even in painting; and the +Arcadian landscape of Poussin, representing the rural festivity +of swains, would lose much of its charm if it wanted the +monument and inscription. An example had been set of such +contrasted ideas in many epigrams of the Greeks, and also in +the Odes of Anacreon, who constantly excites himself and +fellow-passengers to unrestrained enjoyment at every stage, +by recalling to remembrance the irresistible speed with which +they are hurried to the conclusion of their journey— +</p> +<pb n="279"/><anchor id="Pg279"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὁ δ’ Ερως, χιτωνα δησας</foreign><!--[Greek: "Ho d' Erôs, chitôna dêsas--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὑπερ αυχενος παπυρῳ,</foreign><!--Hyper auchenos papyrô,--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Μεθυ μοι διηκονειτω.</foreign><!--Methy moi diêkoneitô.--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Τροχος αρματος γαρ οῖα</foreign><!--Trochos armatos gar *hoia--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Βιωτος τρεχει κυλισθεις.</foreign><!--Biôtos trechei kylistheis.--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὀλιγη δε κεισομεσθα</foreign><!--Oligê de keisomestha--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Κονις, ὀστεων λυθεντων.</foreign><!--Konis, osteôn lythentôn.]--></q></l> + <l rend="margin-left:10">Od. IV.</l> +</lg> + +<p> +<q>The ungodly,</q> says the <hi rend="italic">Wisdom of Solomon</hi>, <q>reason +with themselves, but not aright. Our life is short—our time +is a very shadow that passeth away—and, after our end, there +is no returning. Come on, therefore, let us enjoy the good +things that are present, and let us speedily use the creatures +like as in youth. Let us fill ourselves with costly wine and +ointments, and let no flower of the spring pass by us; let us +crown ourselves with rose-buds, before they be withered. Let +none of us go without his part of our voluptuousness; let us +leave tokens of our joyfulness in every place: For this is +our portion, and our lot in this<note place="foot">C. II.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Among the Latin poets no specimen, perhaps, exists so +perfect of this voluptuous yet pensive morality or immorality, +as the <hi rend="italic">Vivamus, mea Lesbia</hi>, of Catullus. It is a theme, too, +in which he has been frequently followed, if not imitated, by +succeeding poets—by Horace, in particular, who, amid all the +delights of love and wine, seldom allows himself to forget the +closing scene of existence. Many of them too, like Catullus, +have employed the argument of the certainty and speediness +of death for the promotion of love and pleasure— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Interea, dum fata sinunt, jungamus amores;</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="pre: none">Jam veniet tenebris Mors adoperta caput<note place="foot">Tibullus, Lib. I. El. 1.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And, in like manner, Propertius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Dum nos fata sinunt, oculos satiemus amore;</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="pre: none">Nox tibi longa venit nec reditura dies.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There is not much of this in the amatory or convivial poetry +of the moderns. Waller has some traces of it; but a modern +prose writer hath most beautifully, and with greater boldness +than any of his predecessors, represented not merely the +thoughts, but the actual image of mortality and decay, as exciting +to a more full and rapid grasp at tangible enjoyments. +Anastasius, while journeying amid the tombs of Scutari, +breathing the damp deadly effluvia, and treading on a swelling +soil, ready to burst with its festering contents, asks him<pb n="280"/><anchor id="Pg280"/>self,—<q>Shall I, creature of clay like those here buried—I, who +travel through life as I do on this road, with the remains of +past generations strewed around me—I, who, whether my +journey last a few hours, more or less, must still, like those here +deposited, in a short time rejoin the silent tenants of a cluster +of tombs—be stretched out by the side of some already sleeping +corpse—and be left to rest, for the remainder of time, with +all my hopes and fears, all my faculties and prospects, consigned +to a cold couch of clammy earth—Shall I leave the +rose to blush along my path unheeded—the purple grape to +wither unculled over my head * * *? Far from my thoughts +be such folly! Whatever tempts, let me take—whatever bears +the name of enjoyment henceforth, let me, while I can, make +my own<note place="foot">Vol. III. p. 14, 2d. ed.</note>.</q>—The French writers, like Chaulieu and Gresset, +who paint themselves as finding in philosophy and the Muses +sufficient compensation for the dissatisfaction attending +worldly pleasures, frequently urge the shortness of life, not +as an argument for indulging in wantonness or wine, but +for enjoying, to the utmost, the innocent delights of rural tranquillity— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Fontenay, lieu délicieux,</q></l> +<l>Ou je vis d’abord la lumiere,</l> +<l>Bientôt au bout de ma carriere</l> +<l>Chez toi je joindrai mes ayeux.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Muses, qui dans ce lieu champêtre</q></l> +<l>Avec soin me fites nourrir—</l> +<l>Beaux arbres qui m’avez vu naître</l> +<l>Bientôt vous me verrez mourir:</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Cependant du frais de votre ombre</q></l> +<l>Il faut sagement profiter,</l> +<l>Sans regret pret a vous quitter</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Pour ce Manoir terrible et sombre.</q>—<hi rend="italic">Chaulieu.</hi></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The united sentiment of enjoying the delights of love, and +beauties of nature, as suggested by the shortness of the period +allotted for their possession, has been happily expressed by +Mallet, in his celebrated song to the Scotch tune, <hi rend="italic">The Birks +of Invermay</hi>: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Let us, Amanda, timely wise,</q></l> +<l>Like <hi rend="italic">them</hi> improve the hour that flies;</l> +<l>For soon the winter of the year,</l> +<l>And Age, life’s winter, will appear.</l> +<l>At this thy living bloom must fade,</l> +<l>As that will strip the verdant shade:</l> +<pb n="281"/><anchor id="Pg281"/><l>Our taste of pleasure then is o’er—</l> +<l>The feathered songsters love no more:</l> +<l>And when they droop, and we decay,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Adieu, the shades of Invermay!</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +It will not fail, however, to be remarked, that in the ode of +Catullus, which has recalled these verses to our recollection, +there is a double contrast, from comparing the long, dark, +and everlasting sleep—the <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">μακρον, ατερμονα, νηγρετον ὑπνον</foreign><!--[Greek: makron, atermona, nêgreton hypnon]-->, with +the quick and constant succession of suns, by which we are +daily enlightened— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Soles occidere et redire possunt:</q></l> +<l>Nobis, cum semel occidit brevis lux,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nox est perpetua una dormienda.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Poets, in all ages, have been fond of contrasting the destined +course of human life with the reparation of the sun and moon, +and with the revival of nature, produced by the succession of +seasons. The image drawn from the sun, and here employed +by Catullus, is one of the most natural and frequent. It has +been beautifully attempted by several modern Latin poets. +Thus by Lotichius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Ergo ubi permensus cœlum sol occidit, idem</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Purpureo vestit lumine rursus humum:</l> +<l>Nos ubi decidimus, defuncti munere vitæ,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Urget perpetua lumina nocte sopor.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And still more successfully by Jortin— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Hei mihi lege ratà sol occidit atque resurgit.</q></l> +<l> * * * *</l> +<l>Nos domini rerum—nos magna et pulchra minati,</l> +<l>Cum breve ver vitæ robustaque transiit ætas,</l> +<l>Deficimus; neque nos ordo revolubilis auras</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Reddit in ætherias, tumuli nec claustra resolvit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Other modern Latin poets have chosen this ode as a sort of +theme or text, which they have dilated into long poems. Of +these, perhaps the most agreeable is a youthful production of +Muretus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ludamus, mea Margari, et jocemur,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The most ancient French imitator is the old poet Baif, in a +sort of Madrigal. He was followed by Ronsard, Bellay, Pellisson, +La Monnoye, and Dorat. The best imitation, I think, +is that by Simon, which I shall give at full length, once for +all as a fair specimen of the French mode of imitating the +lighter poems of Catullus— +</p> + +<pb n="282"/><anchor id="Pg282"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Vivens, O ma Julie!</q></l> +<l>Jurons d’aimer toujours:</l> +<l>Le printemps de la vie</l> +<l>Est fait pour les amours.</l> +<l>Si l’austère vieillesse</l> +<l>Condamne nos desirs,</l> +<l>Laissons lui sa sagesse,</l> +<l>Et gardons nos plaisirs.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">L’Astre dont la lumiere</q></l> +<l>Nous dispense les jours,</l> +<l>Au bout de sa carriere</l> +<l>Recommence son cours.</l> +<l>Quand le temps, dans sa rage,</l> +<l>A fletti les appas,</l> +<l>Les roses du bel âge</l> +<l>Ne refleurissent pas.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">D’une pudeur farouche</q></l> +<l>Fuis les deguisemens;</l> +<l>Viens donner à ma bouche</l> +<l>Cent baisers ravissans— </l> +<l>Mille autres—Pose encore</l> +<l>Sur mes lèvres de feu</l> +<l>Tes lèvres que j’adore—</l> +<l>Mourons à ce doux jeu.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">De nos baisers sans nombre</q></l> +<l>Le feu rapide et doux</l> +<l>S’échappe comme l’ombre,</l> +<l>Et passe loin de nous:</l> +<l>Mais le sentiment tendre</l> +<l>D’un heureux souvenir,</l> +<l>Dans mon cœur vient reprendre,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">La place du plaisir.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +7. <hi rend="italic">Ad Lesbiam</hi>. His mistress had asked Catullus how +many kisses would satisfy him, and he answers that they must +be as numerous as the sands of the sea— +</p> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Aut quam sidera multa, cum tacet nox,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Furtivos hominum vident amores.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These two lines seem to have been in the view of Ariosto, in +the 14th canto of the <hi rend="italic">Orlando</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">E per quanti occhi il ciel le furtive opre</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Degli amatori, a mezza notte, scopre.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Martial likewise imitates, and refers to this and to the 5th +poem of Catullus, in the 34th epigram of the 6th book— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Basia da nobis, Diadumene, pressa: quot? inquis—</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Oceani fluctus me numerare jubes;</l> +<l>Et maris Ægæi sparsas per littora conchas,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Et quæ Cecropio monte vagantur apes.</l> +<l>Nolo quot arguto dedit exorata Catullo</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Lesbia: pauca cupit, qui numerare potest.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="283"/><anchor id="Pg283"/> + +<p> +The verses of Catullus have been also imitated in Latin by +Sannazzarius, by Joannes Secundus, of course, in his <hi rend="italic">Basia</hi>, +and by almost all the ancient amatory poets of France. +</p> + +<p> +8. <hi rend="italic">Ad Seipsum</hi>. This is quite in the Greek taste: About +a third of the Odes of Anacreon are addressed <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Εις σεαυτον</foreign><!--[Greek: Eis seauton ]-->. +Catullus here playfully, yet feelingly, remonstrates with himself, +for still pursuing his inconstant Lesbia, by whom he had +been forsaken. +</p> + +<p> +9. <hi rend="italic">Ad Verannium</hi>. This is one of the most pleasing of +the shorter poems. Catullus congratulates his friend Verannius +on his return from Spain, and expresses his joy in terms +more touching and natural than anything in the 12th Satire of +Juvenal, or the 36th Ode of the 1st Book of Horace, which +were both written on similar occasions. +</p> + +<p> +10. <hi rend="italic">De Varri Scorto</hi>. Catullus gives an account of a visit +which he paid at the house of a courtezan, along with his +friend Varrus, and relates, in a lively manner, the conversation +which he had with the lady on the subject of the acquisitions +made by him in Bithynia, from which he had lately +returned. There seems here a hit to have been intended +against Cæsar, of whose conduct in that country some scandalous +anecdotes were afloat. The epigram, however, appears +chiefly directed against those cross-examiners, who are +not to be put off with indefinite answers, and in whose +company one must be constantly on guard. In fact, the lady +detects Catullus making an unfounded boast of his Bithynian +acquisitions, and he accordingly exclaims, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Sed tu insulsa male, et molesta vivis,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Per quam non licet esse negligentem.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +11. <hi rend="italic">Ad Furium et Aurelium</hi>. This ode commences in a +higher tone of poetry than any of the preceding. Catullus +addresses his friends, Furius and Aurelius, who, he is confident, +would be ready to accompany him to the most remote +and barbarous quarters of the globe— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Furi et Aureli, comites Catulli,</q></l> +<l>Sive in extremos penetrabit Indos,</l> +<l>Littus ut longe resonante Eoà</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 12"><q rend="pre: none">Tunditur undâ.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This verse was no doubt in the view of Horace, in the sixth +Ode of the second Book, where he addresses his friend Septimius, +and adopts the elegant and melodious Sapphic stanza +employed by Catullus— +</p> + +<pb n="284"/><anchor id="Pg284"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Septimi, Gades aditure mecum, et</q></l> +<l>Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra, et</l> +<l>Barbaras Syrtes, ubi Maura semper</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 12"><q rend="pre: none">Æstuat unda.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Horace, however, has closed his ode with a few lines, perhaps +the most beautiful and tender in the whole circle of Latin +poetry, and which strike us the more, as pathos is not that +poet’s peculiar excellence— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ille te mecum locus et beati,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus, on the other hand, after preserving an elevated +strain of poetry for four stanzas, concludes with requesting +his friends to deliver a ridiculous message to his mistress, +who +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nec meum respectet, ut ante, amorem,</q></l> +<l>Qui illius culpa cecidit; velut prati</l> +<l>Ultimi flos, prætereunte postquam</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 12"><q rend="pre: none">Tactus aratro est.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This last most beautiful image has been imitated by various +poets. Virgil has not disdained to transfer it to his Æneid— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Purpureus veluti cum flos succisus aratro</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Languescit moriens<note place="foot">Lib. IX. v. 435.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Fracastoro has employed the same metaphor with hardly less +elegance in his consolatory epistle to Turri, on the loss of his +child— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Jacet ille velut succisus aratro</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Flos tener, et frustra non audit tanta gementem;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and Ariosto has introduced it in the eighteenth canto of the +Orlando— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Come purpureo fior languendo muore</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Che ’l vomere al passar tagliato lassa.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +13. <hi rend="italic">Ad Fabullum</hi>. Our poet invites Fabullus to supper, +on condition that he will bring his provisions along with +him— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Nam tui Catulli</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Plenus sacculus est aranearum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="285"/><anchor id="Pg285"/> + +<p> +On his own part, he promises only a hearty welcome, and the +most exquisite ointments. In the poetry of social kindness +and friendship, Catullus is eminently happy; and we regret to +find that this tone, which has so much prevailed in the +preceding odes, subsequently changes into bitter and gross +invective. +</p> + +<p> +The thirteen following poems are chiefly occupied with +vehement and indelicate abuse of those friends of the poet, +Furius and Aurelius, who were men of some quality and distinction, +but had wasted their fortunes by extravagance and +debauchery. In a former ode, we have seen him confident +that they would readily accompany him to the wildest or remotest +quarters of the globe: But he had subsequently quarrelled +with them, partly because they had stigmatized his +verses as soft and effeminate; and, in revenge for this affront, +he upbraids them with their poverty and vices. Of these +thirteen poems, the last, addressed to Furius, is a striking picture +of the sheltered situation of a villa. In the common +editions, the description refers to the villa of Catullus himself, +but Muretus thinks, it was rather meant to be applied to that +of Furius: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Furi, villula vostra non ad Austri,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> + 27. <hi rend="italic">Ad Pocillatorem puerum</hi>. This address, in which +Catullus calls on his cupbearer to pour out for him copious +and unmixed libations of Falernian, is quite in the spirit of +Anacreon: it breathes all his easy and joyous gaiety, and the +enthusiasm inspired by the grape. +</p> + +<p> + 28. <hi rend="italic">Ad Verannium et Fabullum</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Pisonis comites cohors inanis,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus condoles with these friends on account of the little +advantage they had reaped from accompanying the Prætor +Piso to his province—comparing their situation to the similar +circumstances in which he had himself been placed with +Memmius in Bithynia. +</p> + +<p> +There is a parody on this piece of Catullus by the celebrated +Huet, Bishop of Avranches— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Bocharti comites cohors inanis.</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In his youth, Huet had accompanied Bochart to Sweden, on +the invitation of Queen Christina, and appears to have been as +little gratified by his northern expedition, as Catullus by his +voyage to Bithynia. +</p> + +<pb n="286"/><anchor id="Pg286"/> + +<p> +29. <hi rend="italic">In Cæsarem</hi>. Julius Cæsar, while yet but the general +of the Roman republic, had been accustomed, during his stay +in the north of Italy, to lodge at the house of the father of +Catullus in Verona. Notwithstanding the intimacy which in +consequence subsisted between Cæsar and his father, Catullus +lampooned the former on more than one occasion. In the +present epigram, he pours on him an unmeasured abuse, chiefly +for having bestowed the plunder of Britain and Gaul on his +favourite, the infamous Mamurra, who appropriated the public +money, and the spoils of whole nations, to support his boundless +extravagance. There is a story which has become very +common on the authority of Suetonius, that Cæsar invited +Catullus to supper on the day on which he first read some +satirical verses of the poet against himself and Mamurra, and +that he continued to lodge with his father as before<note place="foot">Valerium Catullum, a quo sibi versiculis de Mamurrâ perpetua stigmata imposita +non dissimulaverat, satisfacientem, <hi rend="italic">eâdem die</hi> adhibuit cœnæ, hospitioque patris +ejus, sicut consueverat, uti perseveravit.—Sueton. <hi rend="italic">In Cæsar.</hi> c. 73.</note>. It +appears that on one occasion, when some scurrilous verses by +Catullus were shown to him, he supped with Cicero at his +villa near Puteoli. On the 19th, he staid at the house of +Philippus till one in the afternoon, but saw nobody; he then +walked on the shore across to Cicero’s villa—bathed after two +o’clock, and heard the verses on Mamurra read, at which he +never changed countenance<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Epist. ad Attic.</hi> XIII. 52. Inde ambulavit in littore. Post horam viii. +in balneum; tum audivit de Mamurrâ; vultum non mutavit; unctus est; accubuit.</note>. Now, this was in the year 708, +after the civil war had been ended, by the defeat and death +of the younger Pompey in Spain. It is most likely that this +29th epigram was the one which was read to him at Cicero’s +villa; and the 57th epigram, also directed against Cæsar and +Mamurra, is probably that concerning which the above anecdote +is related by Suetonius. Though it stands last of the +two in the works of Catullus, it was evidently written before +the 29th. He talks in it of Cæsar and Mamurra, as of persons +who were still on a footing of equality—in the other, he speaks +of their dividing the spoils of the provinces, Gaul, Britain, +Pontus, and Spain. The coolness and indifference which +Cæsar showed with regard to the first epigram written against +him, and the forgiveness he extended to its author, encouraged +Cicero, who was a gossip and newsmonger, or those who +attended him, to read to him another of the same description +while bathing at the Puteolan Villa. +</p> + +<p> +31. <hi rend="italic">Ad Sirmionem Peninsulam</hi>. This heart-soothing invocation, +which is perhaps the most pleasing of all the productions +of Catullus, is addressed to the peninsula of Sirmio, in +<pb n="287"/><anchor id="Pg287"/>the territory of Verona, on which the principal and favourite +villa of our poet was situated. Sirmio was a peninsular +promontory, of about two miles circumference, projecting +into the Benacus, now the Lago di Garda—a lake celebrated +by Virgil as one of the noblest ornaments of Italy, and the +praises of which have been loudly re-echoed by the modern +Latin poets of that country, particularly by Fracastoro, who +dwelt in its vicinity, and who, while lamenting the untimely +death of his poetical friend, Marc Antonio del Torri, beautifully +represents the shade of Catullus, as still nightly wandering +amidst these favourite scenes— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Te ripæ flevere Athesis; te voce vocare</q></l> +<l>Auditæ per noctem umbræ, manesque Catulli,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Et patrios mulcere novâ dulcedine lucos<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Syphilis</hi>, Lib. I.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Vestiges of the magnificent house supposed to have belonged +to Catullus, are yet shown on this peninsula. Its ruins, which +lie near the borders of the lake, still give the idea of an +extensive palace. There are even now, as we are informed +by travellers<note place="foot">Colt Hoare’s Continuat. of Eustace’s Travels.</note>, sufficient remains of mason-work, pilasters, +vaults, walls, and subterraneous passages, to assist the imagination +in representing to itself what the building was when +entire, at least in point of extent and situation. The length +of the whole construction, from north to south, is about 700 +feet, and the breadth upwards of 300. The ground on which +it stood does not appear to have been level, and the fall to +the west was supplied by rows of vaults, placed on each other, +the top of which formed a terrace. On the east, the structure +had been raised on those steep and solid rocks which lined +the shore; on the front, which was to the north, and commanded +a magnificent view of the lake, an immense portico +seems to have projected from the building: under the ruins, +there are a number of subterraneous vaults, one of which ran +through the middle of the edifice, and along its whole length<note place="foot">Henin, <hi rend="italic">Journal du Siege de Peschiera</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The peninsula on which the villa of Catullus was situated, +is not surpassed in beauty or fertility by any spot in Italy. +<q>Sirmione,</q> says Eustace<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Classical Tour</hi>, Vol. I. c. 5. 8vo edition.</note>, <q>appears as an island, so low and +so narrow is the bank that unites it to the mainland. The +promontory spreads behind the town, and rises into a hill +entirely covered with olives. Catullus,</q> he continues, <q>undoubtedly +inhabited this spot, and certainly he could not have +chosen a more delightful retreat. In the centre of a magni<pb n="288"/><anchor id="Pg288"/>ficent lake, surrounded with scenery of the greatest variety +and majesty, secluded from the world, yet beholding from +his garden the villas of his Veronese friends, he might have +enjoyed alternately the pleasures of retirement, and society; +and daily, without the sacrifice of his connexions, which +Horace seemed inclined to make in a moment of despondency, +he might have contemplated the grandeur and agitation of +the ocean, without its terrors and immensity. Besides, the +soil is fertile, and its surface varied; sometimes shelving in a +gentle declivity, at other times breaking in craggy magnificence, +and thus furnishing every requisite for delightful walks +and luxurious baths; while the views vary at every step, presenting +rich coasts or barren mountains, sometimes confined +to the cultivated scenes of the neighbouring shore, and at +other times bewildered and lost in the windings of the lake, +or in the recesses of the Alps. In short, more convenience +and more beauty are seldom united<note place="foot">In the year 1797, Buonaparte, who was at that time commander-in-chief of the +army of Italy, visited in person this spot, which, during the life of Catullus, had been +his retreat and sanctuary, even from the despotism of Cæsar. While travelling from +Milan to Perseriano, to conclude the treaty of Campo Formio, he turned off from +the road, between Brescia and Peschiera, to visit the peninsula of Sirmio. About +two years afterwards, the French officers employed at the siege of Peschiera, which +is eight miles distant from Sirmio, gave a brilliant <hi rend="italic">fête champêtre</hi> in this classic +retirement, in honour of Catullus, as soon as their military operations against Peschiera +had been brought to a successful conclusion. General St Michel, who had +conducted them, invited all the Polish officers who were present at the siege, and +some of the inhabitants of Sirmio—particularly the dramatic poet, Anelli. During +the repast, this bard, and the French generals, Lacombe and St Michel, sung and +recited in turn verses of their own composition; and which flowed spontaneously, +it is said by one who was present, from the inspiration of scenes so rich in poetic +remembrances. The toasts were—<hi rend="italic">The Memory of Catullus</hi>, the most elegant of +Latin poets—<hi rend="italic">Buonaparte</hi>, who honours great men amid the tumult of arms—who +celebrated Virgil at Mantua, and paid homage to Catullus, by visiting the peninsula +of Sirmio—<hi rend="italic">General Miollis</hi>, the protector of sciences and fine arts in Italy. The +festivities were here unpleasantly interrupted by the arrival of all the uninvited inhabitants +of Sirmio, who came to complain of having been pillaged by the detachment +of French troops which had replaced the Austrian garrison. General Chasseloup +received them with his accustomed urbanity; and, from respect to Catullus, the +troops were marched from that canton to another district, which had not yet been +plundered, and had not the good fortune to have been the residence of a licentious +poet.—(Henin, <hi rend="italic">Jour. Historique des Operat. Militaires du Siege de Peschiera</hi>.)</note>.</q> No wonder, then, that +Catullus, jaded and disappointed by his expedition to Bithynia, +should, on his return, have exclaimed with transport, that the +spot was not to be matched in the wide range of the world +of waters; or that he should have unloaded his mind of its +cares, in language so perfect, yet simple, that it could only +have flowed from a real and exquisite feeling. No poem in +the Latin language expresses tender feelings more tenderly, +and home feelings more naturally, than the Invocation to +Sirmio, in which the verses soothe and refresh us somewhat +<pb n="289"/><anchor id="Pg289"/>in the manner we suppose Catullus himself to have been, by +the trees that shaded the promontory, and by the waters of +the lake below— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quam te libenter, quamque lætus inviso!</q></l> +<l>Vix me ipse credens Thyniam, atque Bithynos</l> +<l>Liquisse campos, et videre te in tuto.</l> +<l>O quid solutis est beatius curis?</l> +<l>Cum mens onus reponit, ac peregrino</l> +<l>Labore fessi venimus larem ad nostrum,</l> +<l>Desideratoque acquiescimus lecto.</l> +<l>Hoc est, quod unum est pro laboribus tantis.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Salve, O venusta Sirmio, atque hero gaude.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These lines show that the most refined and tender feelings +were as familiar to the bosom of Catullus as the grossest. +Nothing can be more delicate than his description of the +emotions of one, who, after many wanderings and vicissitudes +of fortune, returns to his home, and to the scenes beloved in +youth or infancy: Nothing can be more beautiful than his +invocation to the peninsula—his fond request that the delightful +promontory, and the waters by which it was surrounded, +should join in welcoming him home; and, above all, his heartfelt +expression of delight at the prospect of again reclining +on his accustomed couch. +</p> + +<p> +It appears to me, however, that the beauty and the pathos +of the poem is in some degree injured by the last verse,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ridete quicquid est domi cachinnorum,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +which introduces the idea of obstreperous mirth, instead of +that tone of tenderness which pervades the preceding lines +of the ode. One would almost suppose, as probably has +happened in some other cases, that a verse had been subjoined +to this which properly belonged to a different ode, where +mirth, and not tenderness, prevailed. +</p> + +<p> +The modern Latin poets of Italy frequently apostrophize +their favourite villas, in imitation of the address to Sirmio. +Flaminius, in a poem, <hi rend="italic">Ad Agellum suum</hi>, has described his +attachment to his farm and home, and the first lines of it rival +the tender and pleasing invocation of Catullus. Some of the +subsequent lines are written in close imitation of the Roman +poet— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Jam libebit in cubiculo</q></l> +<l>Molles inire somnulos.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Gaudete, fontes rivulique limpidi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="290"/><anchor id="Pg290"/> + +<p> +As also the whole of his address to the same villa, commencing— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Umbræ frigidulæ, arborum susurri.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +One of the most pleasing features in the works of the modern +Latin poets of Italy, is the descriptions of their villas, their +regret at leaving them, or their invitations to friends to come +and witness their happiness. Hence Fracastoro’s villa, in the +vicinity of Verona, Ambra, and <hi rend="italic">Pulcherrima Mergellina</hi>, are +now almost esteemed classic spots, like Tusculum or Tibur. +</p> + +<p> +The invocation to the peninsula of Sirmio was evidently +written soon after the return of Catullus from Bithynia; and +his next poem worth noticing is a similar address to his villa +near Tibur. The thought, however, in this poem, is very +forced and poor. Catullus having been invited by his friend +Sextius, according to a common custom at Rome, to be one +of a party assembled at his house for the purpose of hearing +an oration composed by their host, had contracted such a +cold from its frigidity, that he was obliged to leave Rome, +and retire to this seat, in order to recover from its effects. +For his speedy restoration to health, he now gives thanks to +his salubrious villa. This residence was situated on the confines +of the ancient Latian and Sabine <anchor id="corr290"/><corr sic="teritories">territories</corr>, and the villas +there, as we learn from this ode, were sometimes called Tiburtine, +from the town of Tibur, and sometimes Sabine, from +the district where they lay; but the former appellation, it +seems, was greatly preferred by Catullus. As long as the +odes of Horace survive, the +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Domus Albuneæ resonantis,</q></l> +<l>Et præceps Anio, et Tiburni lucus, et uda</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Mobilibus pomaria rivis,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +will be remembered as forming one of the most delightful +retreats in Italy, and one which was so agreeable to its poet, +that he wished that of all others it might be the shelter and +refuge of his old age. From the present aspect of Tivoli, the +charm of the villas at the ancient Tibur may be still appreciated. +<q>We ascended,</q> says Eustace, <q>the high hill on +which Tivoli stands, passing through groves of olives, till we +reached the summit. This town, the Tibur of the ancients, +stands in a delightful situation, sheltered by Monte Catillo, +and a semicircular range of Sabine mountains, and commanding, +on the other side, an extensive view over the Campagna, +bounded by the sea, Rome, Mount Soracte, and the pyramidal +hills of Monticelli and Monte Rotondo, the ancient +<pb n="291"/><anchor id="Pg291"/>Eretum. But the pride and ornament of Tivoli are still, as +anciently, the falls and the windings of the Anio, now Teverone. +This river having meandered from its source through +the vales of Sabina, glides gently through Tivoli, till, coming +to the brink of a rock, it precipitates itself in one mass down +the steep, and then boiling for an instant in its narrow channel, +rushes headlong through a chasm in the rock into the +caverns below.* * * To enjoy the scenery to advantage, the +traveller must cross the bridge, and follow the road which +runs at the foot of the classic Monte Catillo, and winds along +the banks of the Anio. As he advances he will have on his +left the steep banks covered with trees, shrubs, and gardens, +and on his right the bold but varying swells of the hills +shaded with groves of olives. These sunny declivities were +anciently interspersed with splendid villas, the favourite +abodes of the most luxurious and refined Romans. They are +now replaced by two solitary convents, but their site, often +conjectural or traditionary, is sometimes marked by scanty +<anchor id="corr291"/><corr sic="vestages">vestiges</corr> of ruins, and now and then by the more probable +resemblance of a name<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Classical Tour</hi>, Vol. II. c. 7.</note>.</q> Eustace does not particularly mention +the farm or villa of Catullus. In the travels, however, +which pass under the name of M. Blainville, written in the +beginning of last century, we are informed, that a monastery +of the religious order of Mount Olivet was then established +on the spot where formerly stood the Tiburtine villa of Catullus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Travels through Holland, &c. but especially Italy</hi>, Vol. II. chap. 39.</note>. +M. de Castellan fixes on the same spot, on account +of its situation between the Sabine and Tiburtine territory. +<q>D’ailleurs,</q> continues he, <q>il n’est pas d’endroit plus retiré, +mieux garanti des vents, que cet angle rentrant de la vallée, +entouré de tous côtes par de hautes montagnes; ce qui est +encore un des caracteres du local choisi par notre poëte, qui +pretendoit y être à l’abri de tout autre vent que de celui qui +l’expose à la vengeance de sa maitresse<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Lettres sur l’Italie</hi>, Tom. II. let. 36. Paris, 1819.</note>.</q> It would appear +from Forsyth’s Travels, that a spot is still fixed on as the site +of the residence of Catullus. <q>The villa of Catullus,</q> he +says, <q>is easily ascertained by his own minute description of +the place, by excavated marbles, and by the popular name of +Truglia.</q> This spot, which is close to the church of St Angelo +in Piavola, is on the opposite side of the Anio from +Tibur, about a mile north from that town, and on the north +side of Monte Catillo, or what might be called the back of +that hill, in reference to the situation of Tibur. The Anio +<pb n="292"/><anchor id="Pg292"/>divides the ancient Latian from the Sabine territory, and the +villa of Catullus was on the Sabine side of the river, but was +called Tiburtine from the vicinity of Tibur<note place="foot"><p>Nibby, in his <hi rend="italic">Viaggio Antiquario ne contorni di Roma</hi>, (Ed. 1819. 2 Tom. +8vo,) in opposition to all previous authority, has denied that this was the site of the +villa of Catullus, which he has removed to a spot due east from Tibur, between the +Acque Albule and Ponte Lucano. His opinion, however, is rested on the 26th +poem of Catullus, of which he has totally misunderstood the meaning,— +</p> +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Furi, Villula nostra non ad Austri</q></l> +<l>Flatus opposita est, nec ad Favoni,</l> +<l>Nec sævi Boreæ, aut Apeliotæ;</l> +<l>Verum ad millia quindecim et ducentos—</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">O ventum horribilem atque pestilentem.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +<p> +Nibby strangely supposes that the fourth line of the above verses means that the +villa is 15 miles 200 paces from Rome, and, therefore, that it cannot be at St Angelo +in Piavola, the distance of which from Rome is not 15 miles 200 paces.—<q>Questi +versi,</q> says he, <q>non solo non sono così decisìvi per situarla precisamente a St Angelo, +piu tosto che in altri luoghi di questi contorni; ma assolutamente la escludono, +poichè la stabaliscono quindìci miglia, e duecento passi vicino a Roma.</q>—T. I. p. +166. +</p><p> +Now, in the first place, according to Muretus and the best commentators, this ode +does not at all refer to the villa of Catullus, but of Furius, whom he addresses, since +the correct reading in the first line is not Villula <hi rend="italic">nostra</hi>, but <hi rend="italic">Vostra</hi>. Allowing, +however, that it should be <hi rend="italic">nostra</hi>, it is quite impossible to extort from the fourth +line any proof that the villa was 15 miles 200 paces from Rome. Translated <hi rend="italic">verbatim</hi>, +it is as follows:—<q>Furius, our (your) villa is not exposed or liable to the blasts +of Auster or Favonius, or the sharp Boreas, or the Apeliot wind, but to fifteen thousand +and two hundred—O horrible and pestilent wind!</q> Now, the question is, to +<hi rend="italic">what</hi> 15,000,200 is the villa exposed? (<hi rend="italic">opposita</hi>). Every commentator whom I +have consulted, supplies sesterces, or other pieces of money; that is to say, it was +mortgaged or pledged for that sum, which would sweep it away more effectually +than any wind. Nibby’s interpretation, that it is not exposed to Auster or Boreas, +&c. but is 15 miles 200 paces distant from Rome, is not many miles, or even paces, +distant from absolute nonsense; and, moreover, quindecim millia, is not good Latin +for 15 miles.</p></note>. +</p> + +<p> +The Romans, and particularly the Roman poets, as if the +rustic spirit of their Italian ancestry was not altogether banished +by the buildings of Rome, appear to have had a genuine +and exquisite relish for the delights of the country. This +feeling was not inspired by fondness for field-sports, since, although +habituated to violent exercises, the chase never was a +favourite amusement among the Romans, and they preferred +seeing wild animals baited in the amphitheatre, to hunting +them down in their native forests. The country then was not +relished as we are apt to enjoy it, for the sake of exercise or +rural pastimes, but solely for its amenity and repose, and the +mental tranquillity which it diffused. With them it seems to +have been truely, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">The relish for the calm delight</q></l> +<l>Of verdant vales and fountains bright;</l> +<l>Trees that nod on sloping hills,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">And caves that echo tinkling rills.</q>.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="293"/><anchor id="Pg293"/> + +<p> +Love of the country among the Romans thus became conjoined +with the idea of a life of pastoral tranquillity and retirement,—a +life of friendship, liberty, and repose,—free from labour +and care, and all turbulent passions. Scenes of this kind +delight and interest us supremely, whether they be painted +as what is desired or what is enjoyed. We feel how natural +it is for a mind with a certain disposition to relaxation +and indolence, when fatigued with the bustle of life, to long +for security and quiet, and for those sequestered scenes in which +they can be most exquisitely enjoyed. There is much less of +this in the writings of the Greeks, who were originally a sea-faring +and piratical, and not, like the Italians, a pastoral people. +It is thus that, even in their highest state of refinement, +the manners and feelings of nations bear some affinity to their +original rudeness, though that rudeness itself has been imperceptibly +converted into a source of elegance and ornament. +</p> + +<p> +34. <hi rend="italic">Seculare carmen ad Dianam</hi>. This is the first strictly +lyric production of Catullus which occurs, and there are only +three other poems of a similar class. In Greece, the public +games afforded a noble occasion for the display of lyric poetry, +and the sensibility of the Greeks fitted them to follow its highest +flights. But it was not so among the Romans. They had +no solemn festivals of assembled states: Their active and ambitious +life deadened them to the emotions which lyric poetry +should excite; and the gods, whose praises form the noblest +themes of the Æolian lyre, were with them rather the creatures +of state policy, than of feeling or imagination. +</p> + +<p> +45. <hi rend="italic">De Acme et Septimio</hi>. Here our poet details the mutual +blandishments and amorous expressions of Acme and Septimius, +with the approbation bestowed on them by Cupid. +This amatory effusion has been freely translated by Cowley:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Whilst on Septimius’ panting breast.</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Meaning nothing less than rest,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +49. <hi rend="italic">Ad M. Tullium</hi>. In this poem, which is addressed to +Cicero as the most eloquent of the Romans, Catullus modestly +returns the orator thanks for some service he had rendered him. +</p> + +<p> +51. <hi rend="italic">Ad Lesbiam</hi>. This is the translation of the celebrated +ode of Sappho, which has been preserved to us by Longinus, +<foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Φαινεται μοι κηνος</foreign><!--[Greek: Phainetai moi kênos]-->, &c. The fourth stanza of the original Greek +has not been translated, but in its place a verse is inserted in +all the editions of Catullus, containing a moral reflection, +which one would hardly have expected from this dissolute +poet: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Otium, Catulle, tibi molestum est:</q></l> +<l>Otio exultas, nimiumque gestis;</l> +<l>Otium reges prius et beatas</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 10"><q rend="pre: none">Perdidit urbes.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="294"/><anchor id="Pg294"/> + +<p> +This stanza is so foreign from the spirit of high excitation in +which the preceding part of the ode is written, that Maffei +suspected it had belonged to some other poem of Catullus; +and Handius, in his <hi rend="italic">Observationes Criticæ</hi>, conjectures that +the fourth stanza, which Catullus translated from the original +Greek, having been lost, and a chasm being thus left, some +idle librarian or scholiast of the middle ages had interpolated +these four lines of misplaced morality, that no gap might appear +in his manuscript<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Observ. Crit. in Catulli Carmina</hi>.</note>. It is not impossible, however, that +this verse may have been intended to express the answer of +the poet’s mistress. +</p> + +<p> +Many amatory poets have tried to imitate this celebrated +ode; but most of them have failed of success. Boileau has +also attempted this far-famed fragment; but although he has +produced an elegant enough poem, he has not expressed the +vehement passion of the Greek original so happily as Catullus. +How different are the rapidity and emotion of the following +stanza, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Lingua sed torpet, tenuis sub artus</q></l> +<l>Flamma dimanat, sonitu suopte</l> +<l>Tintinant aures—gemina teguntur</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 10"><q rend="pre: none">Lumina nocte,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +from the languor of the corresponding lines of the French poet! +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Une nuage confus se repand sur ma vue,</q></l> +<l>Je n’entend plus, je tombe en de douces langueurs,</l> +<l>Et passe, sans haleine, interdite, perdue;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Un frisson me saisit—je tremble, je me meurs.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These lines give us little idea of that furious passion of which +Longinus says the Greek ode expresses all the symptoms. +Racine has been much more happy than Boileau in his imitation +of Sappho. Phædra, in the celebrated French tragedy which +bears the name of that victim of love, thus paints the effects +of the passion with which she was struck at her first view of +Hippolytus:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Athènes me montra mon superbe ennemi:</q></l> +<l>Je le vis, je rougis, je palis à sa vue—</l> +<l>Un trouble s’eleva dans mon ame éperdue,</l> +<l>Mes yeux ne voyoient plus, je ne pouvois parler;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Je sentis tout mon cœur et transir et brûler<note place="foot">Acte I. sc. 3.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +On this passage Voltaire remarks, <q>Peut on mieux imiter Sappho? +Ces vers, quoique imites, coulent de source; chaque +<pb n="295"/><anchor id="Pg295"/>mot trouble les ames sensibles, et les penetre; ce n’est point +une amplification: c’est le chef d’œuvre de la nature et de +l’art<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Dict. Philos.</hi> Art. <hi rend="italic">Amplification</hi>.</note>.</q> A translation by De Lille, which has a very close +resemblance to that of Boileau, is inserted in the delightful +chapter of the <hi rend="italic">Voyage du Jeune Anacharsis</hi>, which treats of +Lesbos and Sappho. Philips, it is well known, attempted a +version of the lyric stanzas of Sappho, which was first printed +with vast commendation in the 229th Number of the Spectator, +where Addison has also remarked, <q>that several of our +countrymen, and Dryden in particular, seem very often to +have copied after this ode of Sappho, in their dramatic writings, +and in their poems upon love.</q> +</p> + +<p> +58. <hi rend="italic">Ad Cœlium de Lesbia</hi>. In this ode, addressed to one +of her former admirers, Catullus gives an account, both tender +and pathetic, of the debaucheries and degraded condition of +Lesbia, to his passion for whom, he had attributed such <anchor id="corr295a"/><corr sic="powful">powerful</corr> +effects in the above imitation of Sappho. +</p> + +<p> +61. <hi rend="italic">In Nuptias Juliæ et Manlii</hi>. We come now to the +three celebrated epithalamiums of Catullus. The first is in +honour of the nuptials of Julia and Manlius, who is generally +supposed to have been Aulus Manlius Torquatus, an intimate +friend of the poet, and a descendant of one of the most noble +patrician families in Rome. This poem has been entitled an +Epithalamium in most of the ancient editions, but Muretus contends +that this is an improper appellation, and that it should +be inscribed <hi rend="italic">Carmen Nuptiale</hi>. <q>An epithalamium,</q> he says, +<q>was supposed to be sung by the virgins when the bride had +retired to the nuptial chamber, whereas in this poem an earlier +part of the ceremony is celebrated and described.</q> This +earlier part, indeed, occupies the greater portion of the poem, +but towards the conclusion the bride is represented as placed +in the chamber of her husband, which may justify its ordinary +title: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Jam licet venias, Marite;</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Uxor in thalamo est tibi,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +In this bridal song the poet first addresses Hymen; and as +the bride was now about to proceed from her paternal mansion +to the house of her husband, invokes his aid in raising +the nuptial hymn. He then describes the bride:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Floridis velut enitens</q></l> +<l>Myrtus Asià ramulis;</l> +<pb n="296"/><anchor id="Pg296"/> +<l>Quos Hamadryades Deæ</l> +<l>Ludicrum sibi roscido</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nutriunt humore.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +A similar image is frequent with other poets, and has been +adopted by Pontanus<note place="foot">Ad Fauniam.</note> and Naugerius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Genethliacon pueri nobilis</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The praises of Hymen follow next:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nil potest sine te Venus,</q></l> +<l>Fama quod bona comprobet,</l> +<l>Commodi capere: at potest</l> +<l>Te volente. Quis huic Deo</l> +<l>Compararier ausit?</l> +</lg> + +<lg> +<l>Nulla quit sine te domus</l> +<l>Liberos dare, nec parens</l> +<l>Stirpe jungier: at potest</l> +<l>Te volente. Quis huic Deo</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Compararier ausit?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Claudian, in his epithalamium on the nuptials of Palladius +and Celerina, and the German poet Lotichius, extol Hymen +in terms similar to those employed in the first of the above +stanzas: and the advantages he confers, alluded to in the +second, have been beautifully touched on by Milton, as also +by Pope, in his chorus of youths and virgins, forming part of +the Duke of Buckingham’s intended tragedy—<hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">But Hymen’s kinder flames unite,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">And burn for ever one,</l> +<l>Chaste as cold Cynthia’s virgin light,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Productive as the sun.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">O source of every social tye,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">United wish and mutual joy,</l> +<l>What various joys on one attend!</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">As son, as father, brother, husband, friend.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus now proceeds to describe the ceremonies with which +the bride was conveyed to the house of her husband, and was +there received. He feigns that he beholds the nuptial pomp +and retinue approaching, and encourages the bride to come +forth, by an elegant compliment to her beauty; as also, by +reminding her of the fair fame and character of her intended +husband. As she approaches, he intimates the freedom of +the ancient Fescennine verses, which were first sung at marriage +festivals. +</p> + +<p> +The bride being at length conducted to her new habitation, +the poet addresses the bridegroom, and shuts up the married +pair: But before concluding, in reference to Torquatus, one +<pb n="297"/><anchor id="Pg297"/>of the husband’s names, he alludes, with exquisite delicacy +and tenderness, to the most-wished-for consequence of this +happy union:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Torquatus, volo, parvulus</q></l> +<l>Matris e gremio suæ</l> +<l>Porrigens teneras manus,</l> +<l>Dulce rideat ad patrem,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Semihiante labello.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The above verse has been thus imitated in an Epithalamium +on the marriage of Lord Spencer, by Sir William +Jones, who pronounces it a picture worthy the pencil of Domenichino: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">And soon to be completely blest,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Soon may a young Torquatus rise,</l> +<l>Who, hanging on his mother’s breast,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">To his known sire shall turn his eyes,</l> +<l>Outstretch his infant arms a while,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Half ope his little lips and smile.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +And thus by Leonard, in his pastoral romance of <hi rend="italic">Alexis</hi>, +where, however, he has omitted the <hi rend="italic">semihiante labello</hi>, the +finest feature in the picture:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quel tableau! quand un jeune enfant,</q></l> +<l>Penché sur le sein de sa mère,</l> +<l>Avec un sourire innocent</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Etendra ses mains vers son père.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This nuptial hymn has been the model of many epithalamiums, +particularly that of Jason and Creusa, sung by the +chorus in Seneca’s <hi rend="italic">Medea</hi>, and of Honorius and Maria, in +Claudian. The modern Latin poets, particularly Justus Lipsius, +have exercised themselves a great deal in this style of +composition; and most of them with evident imitation of the +work of Catullus. It has also been highly applauded by the +commentators; and more than one critic has declared that it +must have been written by the hands of Venus and the Graces—<q>Veneris +et Gratiarum manibus scriptum esse.</q> I wish, +however, they had excepted from their unqualified panegyrics +the coarse imitation of the Fescennine poems, which leaves +on our minds a stronger impression of the prevalence and +extent of Roman vices, than any other passage in the Latin +classics. Martial, and Catullus himself elsewhere, have +branded their enemies; and Juvenal, in bursts of satiric indignation, +has reproached his countrymen with the most shocking +crimes. But here, in a complimentary poem to a patron and +<pb n="298"/><anchor id="Pg298"/>intimate friend, these are jocularly alluded to as the venial +indulgences of his earliest youth. +</p> + +<p> +62. <hi rend="italic">Carmen Nuptiale</hi>. Some parts of this epithalamium +have been taken from Theocritus, particularly from his eighteenth +Idyl, where the Lacedæmonian maids, companions +of Helen, sing before the bridal-chamber of Menelaus<note place="foot">See also Moschus, Idyl 7.</note>. This +second nuptial hymn of Catullus may be regarded as a continuation +of the above poem, being also in honour of the +marriage of Manlius and Julia. The stanzas of the former were +supposed to be sung or recited in the person of the poet, who +only exhorted the chorus of youths and virgins to commence +the nuptial strain. But here these bands contend, in alternate +verses; the maids descanting on the beauty and advantages of +a single life, and the lads on those of marriage. +</p> + +<p> +The young men, companions of the bridegroom, are supposed +to have left him at the rising of the evening star of +love:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l rend="margin-left: 10">—— <q rend="post: none">Vesper Olympo</q></l> +<l>Expectata diu vix tandem lumina tollit.</l> +<l> * * * * *</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Hespere, qui cœlo lucet jucundior ignis?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These lines appear to have been imitated by Spenser in his +Epithalamium— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Ah! when will this long weary day have done!</q></l> +<l>Long though it be, at last I see it gloom,</l> +<l>And the bright evening star, with golden crest,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 14">Appear out of the east;</l> +<l>Fair child of beauty, glorious lamp of love,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">How cheerfully thou lookest from above!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The maids who had accompanied the bride to her husband’s +house, approached the youths who had just left the +bridegroom, and they commence a very elegant contention +concerning the merits of the star, which the chorus of virgins +is pleased to characterize as a cruel planet. They are silenced, +however, by the youths hinting that they are not such enemies +to Hesper as they pretend to be. Then the maids, draw a +beautiful, and, with Catullus, a favourite comparison between +an unblemished virgin, and a delicate flower in a garden: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Ut flos in septis secretus nascitur hortis,</q></l> +<l>Ignotus pecori, nullo convulsus aratro,</l> +<l>Quem mulcent auræ, firmat sol, educat imber;</l> +<pb n="299"/><anchor id="Pg299"/> +<l>Multi illum pueri, multæ optavere puellæ.</l> +<l>Idem cum tenui carptus defloruit ungui,</l> +<l>Nulli illum pueri, nullæ optavere puellæ.</l> +<l>Sic virgo dum intacta manet, tum cara suis; sed</l> +<l>Cum castum amisit, polluto corpore, florem,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nec pueris jucunda manet, nec cara puellis.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +To the sentiment delineated by this image, the youths reply +by one scarcely less beautiful, emblematical of the happiness +of the married state; and as this was a theme in which the +maidens were probably not unwilling to be overcome, they +unite in the last stanza with the chorus of young men, in +recommending to the bride to act the part of a submissive +spouse. +</p> + +<p> +Few passages in Latin poetry have been more frequently +imitated, and none more deservedly, than the above-quoted +verses of Catullus, who certainly excels almost all other +writers, in the beauty and propriety of his similes. The greatest +poets have not disdained to transplant this exquisite flower +of song. Perhaps the most successful imitation is one by the +Prince of the romantic bards of Italy, in the first canto of his +<hi rend="italic">Orlando</hi>, and which it may be amusing to compare with the +original: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">La Verginella è simile alla rosa,</q></l> +<l>Che in bel giardin su la nativa spina,</l> +<l>Mentre sola, e sicura si riposa,</l> +<l>Nè gregge, nè pastor se le avvicina;</l> +<l>L’aura soave, e l’alba rugiadosa,</l> +<l>L’acqua, la terra al suo favor s’inchina:</l> +<l>Giovini vaghi, e donne innamorate,</l> +<l>Amano averne e seni, e tempie ornate.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> +<l>Ma non si tosto dal materno stelo</l> +<l>Rimossa viene, e dal suo ceppo verde;</l> +<l>Che quanto avea dagli uomini, e dal cielo,</l> +<l>Favor, grazia, e bellezza tutto perde.</l> +<l>La vergine, che il fior, di che più zelo,</l> +<l>Che de begli occhi, e della vita, aver dè,</l> +<l>Lascia altrui corre, il pregio, ch’avea dinanti,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Perde nel cor de tutti gli altri amanti.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The reader may perhaps like to see how this theme has +been managed by an old <hi rend="italic">French</hi> poet nearly contemporary +with Ariosto: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">La jeune vierge est semblable à la rose,</q></l> +<l>Au beau jardin, sur l’épine native,</l> +<l>Tandis que sûre et seulette repose,</l> +<l>Sans que troupeau ni berger y arrive;</l> +<l>L’air doux l’échauffe, et l’Aurore l’arrose,</l> +<l>La terre, l’eau par sa faveur l’avive;</l> +<l>Mais jeunes gens et dames amoureuses,</l> +<pb n="300"/><anchor id="Pg300"/><l>De la cueillir ont les mains envieuses;</l> +<l>La terre et l’air, qui la soulaient nourrir,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">La quittent lors et la laissent flétrir<note place="foot">Gohorry.</note>.</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +It is evident that Ariosto has suggested several things to the +French poet, as he has also done to the imitators in our own +language, in which the simile has been frequently attempted, +but not with much success. Ben Jonson has translated it +miserably, substituting doggerel verse for the sweet flow of +the Latin poetry, and verbal antithesis and conceit for that +beautiful simplicity of idea which forms the chief charm of +the original: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Look how a flower that close in closes grows,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Hid from rude cattle, bruised by no plows,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +One of the best of the numerous English imitations is that in +the <hi rend="italic">Lay of Iolante</hi>, introduced in Bland’s <hi rend="italic">Four Slaves of +Cythera</hi>: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="post: none">A tender maid is like a flow’ret sweet,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Within the covert of a garden born;</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Nor flock nor hind disturb the calm retreat,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">But on the parent stalk it blooms untorn,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Refresh’d by vernal rains and gentle heat,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">The balm of evening, and the dews of morn:</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Youths and enamoured maidens vie to wear</l> +<l>This flower—their bosoms grace, or twined around their hair.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="post: none">No sooner gathered from the vernal bough,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Where fresh and blooming to the sight it grew.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Than all who marked its opening beauty blow,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">Forsake the tainted sweet, and faded hue.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">And she who yields, forgetful of her vow,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4">To one but newly loved, another’s due,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Shall live, though high for heavenly beauty prized,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">By youths unhonoured, and by maids despised.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +One of the lines in the passage of Catullus, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Multi illum pueri—multæ optavere puellæ,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and its converse, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Nulli illum pueri—nullæ optavere puellæ,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +have been copied by Ovid in his <hi rend="italic">Metamorphoses</hi><note place="foot">Lib. III.</note>, and applied +to Narcissus, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Multi illum pueri, multæ cupiere puellæ.</q></l> +<l>Sed fuit in tenerâ tam dura superbia formâ,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nulli illum juvenes, nullæ tetigere puellæ.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="301"/><anchor id="Pg301"/> + +<p> +The origin of the line, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Nec pueris jucunda manet, nec cara puellis,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +may be traced to a fragment of the Greek poet Mimnermus: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἀλλ’ ἐχθρος μεν παισιν, ατιμαστος δε γυναιξιν.</foreign><!--[Greek: "All' echthzos men paisin, atimastos de gynaixin."--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +63. <hi rend="italic">De Ati</hi>.—The story of Atis is one of the most mysterious +of the mythological emblems. The fable was explained +by Porphyry; and the Emperor Julian afterwards invented +and published an allegory of this mystic tale. According to +them, the voluntary emasculation of Atis was typical of the +revolution of the sun between the tropics, or the separation +of the human soul from vice and error. In the literal acceptation +in which it is presented by Catullus, the fable seems +an unpromising and rather a peculiar subject for poetry: +indeed, there is no example of a similar event being celebrated +in verse, except the various poems on the fate of +Abelard. It is likewise the only specimen we have in Latin +of the Galliambic measure; so called, because sung by Galli, +the effeminate votaries of Cybele. The Romans, being a more +sober and severe people than the Greeks, gave less encouragement +than they to the celebration of the rites of Bacchus, +and have poured forth but few dithyrambic lines. The genius +of their language and of their usual style of poetry, as well +as their own practical and imitative character, were unfavourable +to the composition of such bold, figurative, and discursive +strains. They have left no verses which can be strictly +called dithyrambic, except, perhaps, the nineteenth ode of +the second book of Horace, and a chorus in the <hi rend="italic">Œdipus</hi> of +Seneca. If not perfectly dithyrambic, the numbers of the +<hi rend="italic">Atis</hi> of Catullus are, however, strongly expressive of distraction +and enthusiasm. The violent bursts of passion are admirably +aided by the irresistible torrent of words, and by the +cadence of a measure powerfully denoting mental agony and +remorse. In this production, now unexampled in every sense +of the word, Catullus is no longer the light agreeable poet, +who counted the kisses of his mistress, and called on the +Cupids to lament her sparrow. His ideas are full of fire, and +his language of wildness: He pours forth his thoughts with +an energy, rapidity, and enthusiasm, so different from his usual +tone, and, indeed, from that of all Latin poets, that this production +has been supposed to be a translation from some +ancient Greek dithyrambic, of which it breathes all the passion +and poetic phrensy. The employment of long compound +epithets, which constantly recur in the <hi rend="italic">Atis</hi>,— +</p> + +<pb n="302"/><anchor id="Pg302"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ubi cerva sylvicultrix, ubi aper nemorivagus,</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +is also a strong mark of imitation of the Greek dithyrambics; +it being supposed, that such sonorous and new-invented words +were most befitting intoxication or religious enthusiasm<note place="foot">Aristotle, <hi rend="italic">Rhetor.</hi> Lib. III. c. 3.</note>. +Anacreon, in his thirteenth ode, alludes to the lamentations +and transports of Atis, as to a well-known poetical tradition: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὁι μεν καλην Κυβηβην</foreign><!--[Greek: Hoi men kalên Kybêbên--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Τον ἡμιθηλυν Ἀττιν</foreign><!--Ton hêmithêlyn Attin--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἐν ὀυρεσιν βοωντα,</foreign><!--En ouresin boônta,--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Λεγουσιν έκμανηναι.</foreign><!--Legôsin ekmanênai.]--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Atis, it appears from the poem of Catullus, was a beautiful +youth, probably of Greece, who, forsaking his home and +parents, sailed with a few companions to Phrygia, and, having +landed, hurried to the grove consecrated to the great goddess +Cybele,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Adiitque opaca sylvis redimita loca Deæ,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There, struck with superstitious phrensy, he qualified himself +for the service of that divinity; and, snatching the musical +instruments used in her worship, he exhorted his companions, +who had followed his example, to ascend to the temple of +Cybele. At this part of the poem, we follow the new votary +of the Phrygian goddess through all his wild traversing of +woods and mountains, till at length, having reached the temple, +Atis and his companions drop asleep, exhausted by fatigue +and mental distraction. Being tranquillized in some measure +by a night’s repose, Atis becomes sensible of the misery of +his situation; and, struck with horror at his rash deed, he +returns to the sea-shore. There he casts his eyes, bathed in +tears, over the ocean homeward; and comparing his former +happiness with his present wretched condition, he pours forth +a complaint unrivalled in energy and pathos. Gibbon talks +of the different emotions produced by the transition of Atis +from the wildest enthusiasm to sober pathetic complaint for +his irretrievable loss<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Decline and fall of the Rom. Emp.</hi> c. 23.</note>; but, in fact, his complaint is not soberly +pathetic—to which the Galliambic measure would be little +suited: it is, on the contrary, the most impassioned expression +of mental agony and bitter regret in the wide compass of +Roman literature: +</p> + +<pb n="303"/><anchor id="Pg303"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Abero foro, palæstrâ, stadio et gymnasiis?</q></l> +<l>Miser, ah miser! querendum est etiam atque etiam, anime:</l> +<l>Ego puber, ego adolescens, ego ephebus, ego puer;</l> +<l>Ego gymnasii fui flos, ego eram decus olei;</l> +<l>Mihi januæ frequentes, mihi limina tepida,</l> +<l>Mihi floridis corollis redimita domus erat,</l> +<l>Linquendum ubi esset, orto mihi Sole, cubiculum.</l> +<l>Egone Deûm ministra et Cybeles famula ferar?</l> +<l>Ego Mænas, ego mei pars, ego vir sterilis ero?</l> +<l>Ego viridis algida Idæ nive amicta loca colam?</l> +<l>Ego vitam agam sub altis Phrygiæ columinibus,</l> +<l>Ubi cerva sylvicultrix, ubi aper nemorivagus?</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Jam jam dolet quod egi, jam jamque pœnitet.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +One is vexed, that the conclusion of this splendid production +should be so puerile. Cybele, dreading the defection and +escape of her newly acquired votary, lets loose a lion, which +drives him back to her groves,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ubi semper omne vitæ spatium famula fuit.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Muretus attempted a Latin Galliambic Address to Bacchus in +imitation of the measure employed in the <hi rend="italic">Atis</hi> of Catullus, +and he has strenuously tried to make his poem resemble its +model by an affected use of uncouth compound epithets. +Pigna, an Italian poet, has adopted similar numbers in a Latin +poem, on the metamorphosis of the water nymph, Pitys, who +was changed into a fir-tree, for having fled from the embraces +of Boreas. In many of the lines he has closely followed Catullus; +but it seems scarcely possible that any modern poet +could excite in his mind the enthusiasm essential for the production +of such works. Catullus probably believed as little +in Atis and Cybele as Muretus, but he lived among men who +did; and though his opinions might not be influenced, his imagination +was tinged with the colours of the age. +</p> + +<p> +<hi rend="italic">Atis</hi> is the name of one of the tragic operas of Quinault, +which, I believe, was the most popular of his pieces except +<hi rend="italic">Armide</hi>; but it has little reference to the classic story of the +votary of Cybele. The French Atis is a vehement and powerful +lover, who elopes with the nymph Sangaride on the +wings of the Zephyrs, which had been placed by Cybele, who +was herself enamoured of the youth, at the disposal of Atis. +It seems a poor production in itself, (how different from the +operas of Metastasio!) but it was embellished by splendid scenery, +and the music of Lulli, adapted to the chorus of Phrygians, +and Zephyrs, and Dreams, and Streams, and Corybantes. +</p> + +<p> +64. <hi rend="italic">Epithalamium Pelei et Thetidis</hi>.—This is the longest +and most elaborate of the productions of Catullus. It displays +much accurate description, as well as pathetic and im<pb n="304"/><anchor id="Pg304"/>passioned incident. Catullus was a Greek scholar, and all +his commentators seem determined that his best poems should +be considered as of Greek invention. I do not believe, however, +that the whole of this epithalamium was taken from any +one poet of Greece, as the <hi rend="italic">Coma Berenices</hi> was from Callimachus; +but the author undoubtedly borrowed a great deal +from various writers of that country. Hesiod wrote an Epithalamium, +<foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἐις Πηλεα και Θετιν</foreign><!--[Greek: Eis Pêlea kai Thetin]--><note place="foot">Fabricius, <hi rend="italic">Bib. Lat.</hi></note>, some fragments of which have +been cited by Tzetzes, in his <hi rend="italic">prolegomena</hi> to Lycophron’s +<hi rend="italic">Cassandra</hi>; and judging from these, it appears to have suggested +several lines of the epithalamium of Catullus. The +adornment, however, and propriety of its language, and the +usual practice of Catullus in other productions, render it probable, +that he has chiefly selected his beauties from the Alexandrian +poets. Valckenar, in his edition of Theocritus, (1779,) +has shown, that the Idyls of Theocritus, particularly the +<hi rend="italic">Adoniazusi</hi>, have been of much service to our Latin poet; and +a late German commentator has pointed out more than twenty +passages, in which he has not merely imitated, but actually +translated, Apollonius Rhodius<note place="foot">Mitscherlichius, <hi rend="italic">in Lect. ad Catull.</hi></note>. +</p> + +<p> +The proper subject of this epithalamium is the festivals held +in Thessaly in honour of the nuptials of Peleus and Thetis; +but it is chiefly occupied with a long episode, containing the +story of Ariadne. It commences with the sailing of the ship +Argo on the celebrated expedition to which that vessel has +given name. The Nereids were so much struck with the unusual +spectacle, that they all emerged from the deep; and +Thetis, one of their number, fell in love with Peleus, who had +accompanied the expedition, and who was instantly seized with +a reciprocal passion. Little is said as to the manner in which +the courtship was conducted, and the poet hastens to the preparations +for the nuptials. On this joyful occasion, all the inhabitants +of Thessaly flock to its capital, Pharsalia. Every +thing in the royal palace is on a magnificent scale; but the +poet chiefly describes the <hi rend="italic">stragula</hi>, or coverlet, of the nuptial +couch, on which was depicted the concluding part of the story +of Theseus and Ariadne. Ariadne is represented as standing +on the beach, where she had been abandoned, while asleep, +by Theseus, and gazing in fixed despair at the departing sail +of her false lover. Never was there a finer picture drawn of +complete mental desolation. She was incapable of exhibiting +violent signs of grief: She neither beats her bosom, nor bursts +into tears; but the diadem which had compressed her locks—the +light mantle which had floated around her form—the veil +<pb n="305"/><anchor id="Pg305"/>which had covered her bosom—all neglected, and fallen at her +feet, were the sport of the waves which dashed the strand, +while she herself, regardless and stupified with horror at her +frightful situation, stood like the motionless statue of a Bacchante,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Saxea ut effigies Bacchantis prospicit Evoe;</q></l> +<l>Non flavo retinens subtilem vertice mitram,</l> +<l>Non contecta levi velatum pectus amictu,</l> +<l>Non tereti strophio luctantes vincta papillas;</l> +<l>Omnia quæ toto delapsa e corpore passim</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ipsius ante pedes fluctus salis alludebant.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The above passage is thus imitated by the author of the elegant +poem <hi rend="italic">Ciris</hi>, which has been attributed to Virgil, and is not +unworthy of his genius: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Infelix virgo tota bacchatur in urbe:</q></l> +<l>Non styrace Idæo fragrantes picta capillos,</l> +<l>Cognita non teneris pedibus Sicyonia servans,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Non niveo retinens baccata monilia collo.</q>—v. 167.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus, leaving Ariadne in the attitude above described, +recapitulates the incidents, by which she had been placed in +this agonizing situation. He relates, in some excellent lines, +the magnanimous enterprize of Theseus—his voyage, and arrival +in Crete: He gives us a picture of the youthful innocence +of Ariadne, reared in the bosom of her mother, like a myrtle +springing up on the solitary banks of the Euphrates, or a flower +whose blossom is brought forth by the breath of spring. The +combat of Theseus with the Minotaur is but shortly and coldly +described. It is obvious that the poet merely intended to +raise our idea of the valour of Theseus, so far as to bestow interest +and dignity on the passion of Ariadne, and to excuse +her for sacrificing to its gratification all feelings of domestic +duty and affection. Having yielded and accompanied her +lover, she was deserted by him, in that forlorn situation, her +deep sense of which had changed her to the likeness of a Bacchante +sculptured in stone. Her first feelings of horror and +astonishment had deprived her of the power of utterance; but +she at length bursts into exclamations against the perfidy of +men, and their breach of vows, which +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Cuncta aerii discerpunt irrita venti.</q></l> +<l>Jam jam nulla viro juranti femina credat,</l> +<l>Nulla viri speret sermones esse fideles:</l> +<l>Qui, dum aliquid cupiens animus prægestit apisci,</l> +<l>Nil metuunt jurare, nihil promittere parcunt.</l> +<l>Sed simul ac cupidæ mentis satiata libido <anchor id="corr305"/><corr sic="est,'">est,</corr></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Dicta nihil metuêre, nihil perjuria curant.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="306"/><anchor id="Pg306"/> + +<p> +This passage has been obviously imitated by Ariosto, in his +<hi rend="italic">Orlando</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Donne, alcuna di voi mai più non sia</q></l> +<l>Che a parole d’amante abbia a dar fede.</l> +<l>L’amante per aver quel che desia,</l> +<l>Senza curar che Dio tutto ode e vede,</l> +<l>Avviluppa promesse, e giuramenti,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Che tutti spargon poi per l’aria i venti.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +After indulging in such general reflections, Ariadne complains +of the cruelty and ingratitude of Theseus in particular, whom +she thus apostrophizes— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quænam te genuit solâ sub rupe leæna?</q></l> +<l>Quod mare conceptum spumantibus exspuit undis?</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quæ Syrtis, quæ Scylla, vorax quæ vasta Charybdis?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These lines seem to have been suggested by the address of +Patroclus to Achilles, near the commencement of the sixteenth +book of the Iliad— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">—— Ὀυκ αρα σοι γε πατηρ ἠν ἱπποτα Πηλευς,</foreign><!--[Greek: Ouk ara soi ge patêr ên hippota Pêleus,--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὀυδε Θετις μητηρ· γλαυκη δε σε τικτε Θαλασσα,</foreign><!--Oude Thetis mêtêr; glaukê de se tikte Thalassa,--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Πετραι δ’ ἠλιβατοι, ὁτι τοι νεος ἐστιν απηνης.</foreign><!-- Petrai d' êlibatoi, hoti toi neos estin apênês].--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus, having put the expression of this idea in the mouth +of a princess abandoned by her lover, it became a sort of <hi rend="italic">Formula</hi> +for deserted heroines among subsequent poets. Thus +Ovid, in the eighth book of his <hi rend="italic">Metamorphoses</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Non genitrix Europa tibi est, sed inhospita Syrtis,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Armeniæ tigres, austroque agitata Charybdis;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and thus Virgil makes Dido address Æneas— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nec tibi Diva parens, generis nec Dardanus auctor,</q></l> +<l>Perfide, sed duris genuit te cautibus horrens</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Caucasus, Hyrcanæque admôrunt ubera tigres.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Tasso, who was a great imitator of the Latin poets, attributes, +from the lips of Armida, a similar genealogy to Rinaldo— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nè te Sofia produsse, e non sei nato</q></l> +<l>Dell’ Azzio sangue tu. Te l’onda insana</l> +<l>Del mar produsse, e ’l Caucaso gelato,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">E le mamme allattar de tigre Ircana.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Boileau had happily enough parodied those rodomontades in +the earlier editions of the <hi rend="italic">Lutrin</hi>; but the passage has been +omitted in all those subsequent to that of 1683— +</p> + +<pb n="307"/><anchor id="Pg307"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Non, ton père à Paris ne fut point boulanger,</q></l> +<l>Et tu n’es point du sang de Gervais, l’horloger;</l> +<l>Ta mère ne fut point la maîtresse d’une coche:</l> +<l>Caucase dans ses flancs te forma d’une roche,</l> +<l>Une tigresse affreuse en quelque antre ecarté,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Te fit sucer son lait avec sa cruauté.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +I do not think the circumstances in which Armida pours forth +her reproaches are judiciously selected. The Ariadne of +Catullus vents her complaints when her betrayer is beyond +reach of hearing, and Dido, though in his presence, before he +had taken his departure: But Armida runs after, and overtakes +Rinaldo, in which there is something degrading. She +expresses, however, more tenderness and amorous devotedness +amid her revilings, than any of her predecessors— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Struggi la fede nostra; anch’io t’affretto;</q></l> +<l>Che dico nostra? Ah non più mia: fedele</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Sono a te solo, idolo mio crudele!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +When she has ended her complaints of the cruelty and +ingratitude of Theseus, Ariadne expresses a very natural wish, +that the ship Argo had never reached her native shores— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Jupiter Omnipotens, utinam ne tempore primo</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Gnosia Cecropiæ tetigissent littora puppes.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Thus, apparently, imitated by Virgil— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Felix, heu nimium felix! si littora tantum</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Nunquam Dardaniæ tetigissent nostra carinæ.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But both these passages, it is probable, were originally drawn +from the beginning of the Medea of Euripides— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἐιθ’ οφελ’ Αργους μη διαπτασθαι σκαφος</foreign><!--[Greek: Eith' ôphel' Argous mê diaptasthai skaphos--></q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Κολχων ες αιαν κυανεας συμπληγαδας.</foreign><!--Kolchôn es aian kyaneas symplêgadas.]--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus proceeds with a much closer imitation of Euripides— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nunc quo me referam? quali spe perdita nitar?</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">An patris auxilium sperem, quemne ipsa reliqui?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +which is almost translated from the Medea— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Νυν ποι τραπωμαι; ποτερα προς πατρος δομους</foreign><!--[Greek: Nyn poi trapômai? potera pros patros domous--></q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὁυς σοι προδουσα και πατραν αφικομην.</foreign><!--Hous soi prodousa kai patran aphikomên.]--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The grief and repentance of Ariadne are at length followed +by a sense of personal danger and hardship; and her pathetic +<pb n="308"/><anchor id="Pg308"/>soliloquy terminates with execrations on the author of her +misfortunes, to which— +</p> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Annuit invicto cœlestûm numine rector;</q></l> +<l>Quo tunc et tellus, atque horrida contremuerunt</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Æquora, concussitque micantia sidera mundus,</q></l> +</lg> + +<p> +an image probably derived from the celebrated description in +the Iliad—<foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἠ και κυανεησιν</foreign><!--[Greek: Ê kai kyaneêsin]-->, &c. This promise of Jupiter was +speedily accomplished, in the well-known and miserable fate +of Ægeus, the father of Theseus. +</p> + +<p> +We are naturally led to compare with Catullus, the efforts +of his own countrymen, particularly those of Ovid and Virgil, +in portraying the agonies of deserted nymphs and princesses. +Both these poets have borrowed largely from their predecessor. +Ovid has treated the subject of Ariadne not less than +four times. In the epistle of Ariadne to Theseus, he has +painted, like Catullus, her disordered person—her sense of +desertion, and remembrance of the benefits she had conferred +on Theseus: But the epistle is a cold production, chiefly +because her grief is not immediately presented before us; and +she merely tells that she had wept, and sighed, and raved. +The minute detail, too, into which she enters, is inconsistent +with her vehement passion. She recollects too well each +heap of sand which retarded her steps, and the thorns on the +summit of the mountain. Returning from her wanderings, +she addresses her couch, of which she asks advice, till she +becomes overpowered by apprehension for the wild beasts and +marine monsters, of which she presents her false lover with +a faithful catalogue. The simple ideas of Catullus are frequently +converted into conceits, and his natural bursts of +passion, into quibbles and artificial points. In the eighth +book of the <hi rend="italic">Metamorphoses</hi>, the melancholy part of Ariadne’s +story is only recalled, in order to introduce the transformation +of her crown into a star. In the third book of the <hi rend="italic">Fasti</hi>, she +deplores the double desertion of Theseus and Bacchus. It +is in the first book of the <hi rend="italic">Art of Love</hi>, that Ovid approaches +nearest to Catullus, particularly in the sudden contrast between +the solitude and melancholy of Ariadne, and the revelry of +the Bacchanalians. Some of Virgil’s imitations of Catullus +have been already pointed out: But part of the complaint of +Dido is addressed to her betrayer, and contains a bitterness +of sarcasm, and eloquence of reproof, which neither Catullus +nor Ovid could reach. +</p> + +<p> +The desertion of Olimpia by Bireno, related in the tenth +canto of the <hi rend="italic">Orlando Furioso</hi>, has, in its incidents at least, a +<pb n="309"/><anchor id="Pg309"/>strong resemblance to the poem of Catullus. Bireno, Duke +of Zealand, while on a voyage from Holland to his own +country, touches on Frisia; and, being smit with love for +Olimpia, daughter of the king, carries her off with him; but, +in the farther progress of the voyage, he lands on a desert +island, and, while Olimpia is asleep, he leaves her, and sets +sail in the darkness of night. Olimpia awakes, and, finding +herself alone, hurries to the beach, and then ascends a rock, +whence she descries, by light of the moon, the departing sail +of her lover. Here, and afterwards while in her tent, she +pours forth her plaints against the treachery of Bireno. In +the details of this story, Ariosto has chiefly copied from Ovid; +but he has also availed himself of several passages in Catullus. +As Ariosto, in his story of Olimpia, principally chose Ovid for +his model, so Tasso, in that of Armida, seems chiefly to have +kept his eye on Virgil and Catullus. But Armida is not like +Ariadne, an injured and innocent maid, nor a stately queen, +like Dido; but a voluptuous and artful magician, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Che nella doglia amara</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Gia tutte non obblia l’arte e le frodi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +It has been mentioned, that the desertion of Ariadne was +represented on one compartment of the coverlet of the nuptial +couch of Peleus—on another division of it the story of Bacchus +and Ariadne was exhibited. The introduction of Bacchus +and his train closes the episode with an animated picture, and +forms a pleasing contrast to the melancholy scenes that precede +it. At the same time, the poet, delicately breaking off +without even hinting at the fair one’s ready acceptance of her +new lover, leaves the pity we feel for her abandonment unweakened +on the mind. +</p> + +<p> +65. <hi rend="italic">Ad Ortalum</hi>. This is the first of the elegies of Catullus, +and indeed the earliest of any length or celebrity which had +hitherto appeared in the Latin language. Elegies were originally +written by the Greeks in alternate hexameter and pentameter +lines, <q>versibus impariter junctis.</q> This measure, +which was at first appropriated to deplore misfortunes, particularly +the loss of friends, was soon employed to complain of +unsuccessful love, and, by a very easy transition, to describe +the delights of gratified passion: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Querimonia primùm,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Post etiam inclusa est voti sententia compos.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Matters were in this state in the age of Mimnermus, who was +contemporary with Solon, and was the most celebrated elegiac +<pb n="310"/><anchor id="Pg310"/>poet of the Greeks. Hence, from his time every poem in that +measure, whatever was the subject, came to be denominated +elegy. The mixed species of verse, however, was always +considered essential, so that the complaint of Bion on the +death of Adonis, or that of Moschus on the loss of Bion, is +hardly accounted such, being written in a different sort of +measure. In the strict acceptation of the term, scarcely any +Greek elegy has descended to us entire, except perhaps a few +lines by Callimachus on the death of Heraclitus. +</p> + +<p> +This elegy of Catullus may be considered as a sort of introduction +to that which follows it. Hortalus, to whom it is +addressed, had requested him to translate from Callimachus +the poem <hi rend="italic">De Coma Berenices</hi>. He apologizes for the delay +which had taken place in complying with the wishes of his +friend, on account of the grief he had experienced from the +premature death of his brother, for whom he bursts forth into +this pathetic lamentation:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="post: none">Nunquam ego te, vitâ frater amabilior,</q></l> +<l>Aspiciam posthac; at certe semper amabo,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Semper mœsta tuâ carmina morte canam;</l> +<l>Qualia sub densis ramorum concinit umbris</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Daulias, absumpti fata gemens Ityli.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This simile is taken from the 19th book of the Odyssey— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὡς δ’ ὁτε Πανδαρεου κουρη, χλωρηις αηδων,</foreign><!--[Greek: Hôs d' hote Pandareou kourê, chlôrêis aêdôn,--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Καλον αειδησιν, έαρος νεον ἰσταμενοιο,</foreign><!--Kalon aeidêsin earos neon histamenoio,--></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Δενδρεων ἐν πεταλοισιν καθεζομενη πυκινοισιν</foreign><!--Dendreôn en petaloisin kathezomenê pykinoisin--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Παιδ’ ολοφυρομενη Ιτυλον φιλον,</foreign><!--Paid' olophyromenê Itylon philon],--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and it appears in turn to have been the foundation of Virgil’s +celebrated comparison:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Qualis populeâ mœrens Philomela sub umbrâ</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Amissos queritur fœtus,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This simile has been beautifully varied and adorned by Moschus<note place="foot">Eidul. IV. v. 21.</note> +and Quintus Calaber<note place="foot">Lib. XII. v. 489.</note>, among the Greeks; and among +the modern Italians by Petrarch, in his exquisite sonnet on +the death of Laura:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Qual Rossignuol che si soave piagne,</q> &c.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and by Naugerius, in his ode <hi rend="italic">Ad Auroram</hi>, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nunc ab umbroso simul esculeto,</q></l> +<l>Daulias late queritur: querelas</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Consonum circa nemus, et jocosa reddit imago.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="311"/><anchor id="Pg311"/> + +<p> +66. <hi rend="italic">De Coma Berenices</hi>, is the poem alluded to in the former +elegy: it is translated from a production of Callimachus, of +which only two distichs remain, one preserved by Theon, a +scholiast, on Aratus, and the other in the <hi rend="italic">Scholia</hi> on Apollonius +Rhodius<note place="foot">Muretus, <hi rend="italic">Comment. in Catull.</hi></note>. +</p> + +<p> +Callimachus was esteemed by all antiquity as the finest +elegiac poet of Greece, or at least as next in merit to Mimnermus. +He belonged to the poetic school which flourished +at Alexandria from the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus to that +of Ptolemy Physcon, and which still sheds a lustre over the +dynasty of the Lagides, in spite of the crimes and personal +deformities with which their names have been sarcastically +associated. +</p> + +<p> +After the partition of the Greek empire among the successors +of Alexander, the city to which he had given name became +the capital of the literary world; and arts and learning +long continued to be protected even by the most degenerate +of the Ptolemies. But the school which subsisted at Alexandria +was of a very different taste and description from that +which had flourished at Athens in the age of Pericles. In +Egypt the Greeks became a more learned, and perhaps a more +philosophical people, than they had been in the days of their +ancient glory at home; but they were no longer a nation, and +with their freedom their whole strength of feeling, and peculiar +tone of mind, were lost. Servitude and royal munificence, +with the consequent spirit of flattery which crept in, and even +the enormous library of Alexandria, were injurious to the +elastic and native spring of poetic fancy. The Egyptian +court was crowded with men of erudition, instead of such +men of genius as had thronged the theatre and <hi rend="italic">Agora</hi> of +Athens. The courtly <hi rend="italic">literati</hi>, the academicians, and the librarians +of Alexandria, were distinguished as critics, grammarians, +geographers, or geometricians. With them poetry +became a matter of study, not of original genius or invention, +and consequently never reached its highest flights. Though +not without amenity and grace, they wanted that boldness, +sublimity, and poetic enthusiasm by which the bards of the +Greek republics were inspired. When, like Apollonius Rhodius, +they attempted poetry of the highest class, they rose +not above an elegant mediocrity; or when they attained perfection, +as in the instance of Theocritus, it was in the inferior +and more delicate branches of the art. Accordingly, these +erudite and ornate poets chiefly selected as the subjects of +their muse didactic topics of astronomy and physics, or ob<pb n="312"/><anchor id="Pg312"/>scure traditions derived from ancient fable. Lycophron immersed +himself in such a sea of fabulous learning, that he +became nearly unintelligible, and all of them were marked +with the blemishes of affectation and obscurity, into which +learned poets are most apt to fall. Among the pleiad of +Alexandrian poets, none had so many of the faults and beauties +of the school to which he belonged as Callimachus. He +was conspicuous for his profound knowledge of the ancient +traditions of Greece, for his poetic art and elegant versification, +but he was also noted for deficiency of invention and +original genius:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Battiades semper toto cantabitur orbe,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Quamvis ingenio non valet, arte valet<note place="foot">Ovid, <hi rend="italic">Amor.</hi> Lib. I. el. 15, v. 14.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The poem of Catullus has some faults, which may be fairly +attributed to his pedantic model—a certain obscurity in point +of diction, and that ostentatious display of erudition, which +characterized the works of the Alexandrian poets. The +Greek original, however, being lost, except two distichs, it is +impossible to institute an accurate comparison; but the Latin +appears to be considerably more diffuse than the Greek. One +distich, which is still extant in the <hi rend="italic">Scholia</hi> on Apollonius, has +been expanded by Catullus into three lines; and the following +preserved by Theon has been dilated into four:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ἡ δε Κονων μ’ ἐβλεψεν εν ῆερι τον Βερενικης</foreign><!--[Greek: Hê de Konôn m' eblepsen en êeri ton Berenikês--></q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Βοστρυχον, ὁν κεινη πασιν ἐθηκε Θεοις</foreign><!--Bostrychon, hon keinê pasin ethêke Theois.]--><anchor id="corr312"/><corr sic="note missing"><note place="foot">[Transcriber’s note: Note missing in original.]</note></corr></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Idem me ille Conon cœlesti lumine vidit</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">E Bereniceo vertice cæsariem,</l> +<l>Fulgentem clare; quam multis illa Deorum,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Lævia protendens brachia, pollicita est.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Here the three words τον <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Βερενικης βοστρυχον</foreign><!--[Greek: ton Berenikês bostrychon]--> have been extended +into <q>E Bereniceo <anchor id="corr312a"/><corr sic="verti">vertice</corr> cæsariem fulgentem,</q> and the single +word <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">ἐθηκε</foreign><!--[Greek: ethêke]--> has formed a whole Latin line, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Lævia protendens brachia, pollicita est<note place="foot">Müller, <hi rend="italic">Einleitung</hi>, T. II. p. 261.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The Latin poem, like its Greek original, is in elegiac verse, +and is supposed to be spoken by the constellation called +<hi rend="italic">Coma Berenices</hi>. It relates how Berenice, the queen and +sister of Ptolemy, (Euergetes,) vowed the consecration of her +<pb n="313"/><anchor id="Pg313"/>locks to the immortals, provided her husband was restored to +her, safe and successful, from a military expedition on which +he had proceeded against the Assyrians. The king having +returned according to her wish, and her shorn locks having +disappeared, it is supposed by one of those fictions which +poetry alone can admit, that Zephyrus, the son of Aurora, +and brother of Memnon, had carried them up to heaven, and +thrown them into the lap of Venus, by whom they were set in +the sky, and were soon afterwards discovered among the constellations +by Conon, a court astronomer. In order to relish +this poem, or to enter into its spirit, we must read it imbued +as it were with the belief and manners of the ancient Egyptians. +The locks of Berenice might be allowed to speak and +desire, because they had been converted into stars, which, by +an ancient philosophic system, were supposed to be possessed +of animation and intelligence. Similar honours had been +conferred on the crown of Ariadne and the ship of Isis, and +the belief in such transformations was at least of that popular +or traditionary nature which fitted them for the purposes of +poetry. The race, too, of the Egyptian Ptolemies, traced +their lineage to Jupiter, which would doubtless facilitate the +reception of the locks of Berenice among the heavenly orbs. +Adulation, however, it must be confessed, could not be carried +higher; the beautiful locks of Berenice, though metamorphosed +into stars, are represented as regretting their former +happy situation, and prefer adorning the brow of Berenice, to +blazing by night in the front of heaven, under the steps of +immortals, or reposing by day in the bosom of Tethys:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Non his tam lætor rebus, quam me abfore semper,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Abfore me a dominæ vertice discrucior.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +But though the poem of Callimachus may have been seriously +written, and gravely read by the court of Ptolemy, the lines +of Catullus often approach to something like pleasantry or +<hi rend="italic">persiflage</hi>: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Invita, O Regina, tuo de vertice cessi ...</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Sed qui se ferro postulet esse parem?</l> +<l>Ille quoque eversus mons est, quem maximum in oris</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Progenies Phthiæ clara supervehitur;</l> +<l>Quum Medi properare novum mare, quumque juventus</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Per medium classi barbara navit Athon.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quid facient crines, quum ferro talia cedant?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +These lines seem intended is a sort of mock-heroic, and remind +us strongly of the <hi rend="italic">Rape of the Lock</hi>: +</p> + +<pb n="314"/><anchor id="Pg314"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Steel could the labours of the gods destroy,</q></l> +<l>And strike to dust the imperial towers of Troy;</l> +<l>Steel could the works of mortal pride confound,</l> +<l>And hew triumphal arches to the ground.</l> +<l>What wonder, then, fair nymph! thy hairs should feel</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">The conquering force of unresisted steel?</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The <hi rend="italic">Coma Earini</hi> of Statius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Sylvæ</hi>, Lib. III.</note>, is a poem of the same description +as the <hi rend="italic">Coma Berenices</hi>. It is written in a style of +sufficiently elegant versification; but what in Callimachus is +a courtly, though perhaps rather extravagant compliment, is in +Statius a servile and disgusting adulation of the loathsome +monster, whose vices he so disgracefully flattered. Antonio +Sebastiani, a Latin poet of modern Italy, has imitated Catullus, +by celebrating the locks of a princess of San-Severino. The +beauty and virtues of his heroine had excited the admiration +of earth, and the love of the gods, but with these the jealousy +of the goddesses. By their influence, a malady evoked from +Styx threatens the life of the princess, and occasions the loss +of her hair. The gods, indignant at this base conspiracy, +commission Iris to convey the fallen locks to the sky, and to +restore to the princess, along with health, her former freshness +and beauty. +</p> + +<p> +68. <hi rend="italic">Ad Manlium</hi>. The principal subject of this elegy, is +the story of Laodamia: The best parts, however, are those +lines in which the poet laments his brother, which are truly +elegiac— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Tu, mea, tu moriens, fregisti commoda, frater;</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Tecum unà tota est nostra sepulta domus;</l> +<l>Omnia tecum unà perierunt gaudia nostra,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Quæ tuus in vita dulcis alebat amor:</l> +<l>Quojus ego interitu totâ de mente fugavi</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Hæc studia, atque omnes delicias animi.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Catullus seems to have entertained a sincere affection for his +brother, and to have deeply deplored his loss; hence he generally +writes well when touching on this tender topic. Indeed, +the only remaining elegy of Catullus worth mentioning, is +that entitled <hi rend="italic">Inferiæ ad Fratris Tumulum</hi>, which is another +beautiful and affectionate tribute to the memory of this beloved +youth. Vulpius had said, in a commentary on Catullus, +that his brother died while accompanying him in his +expedition with Memmius to Bithynia. This, however, is +denied by Ginguené, who quotes two lines from the <hi rend="italic">Inferiæ</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Multas per gentes, et multa per æquora vectus,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Adveni has miseras, frater, ad inferias,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="315"/><anchor id="Pg315"/> + +<p> +in order to show that the poet was at a distance at the time +of his brother’s death, and celebration of his funeral rites. It +is possible, however, that these lines may refer to some subsequent +pilgrimage to his tomb, or, what is most probable, +his brother may have died at Troy, while Catullus was in +Bithynia. +</p> + +<p> +None of the remaining poems of Catullus, though written +in elegiac verse, are at all of the description to which we +now give the name of elegy. They are usually termed epigrams, +and contain the most violent invectives on living characters, +for the vices in which they indulged, and satire the +most unrestrained on their personal deformities; but few of +them are epigrams in the modern acceptation of the word. +An epigram, as is well known, was originally what we now +call a device or inscription, and the term remained, though +the thing itself was changed<note place="foot">Facile intelligimus, mansisse vocem, mutata significatione et potestate vocis. +Vavassor, <hi rend="italic">De Epigrammate</hi>, c. 3.</note>. A Greek anthology consisting +of poems which expressed a simple idea—a sentiment, regret, +or wish, without point or double meaning, had been compiled +by Meleager before the time of Catullus; and hence he had +an opportunity of imitating the style of the Greek epigrams, +and occasionally borrowing their expressions, though generally +with application to some of his enemies at Rome, whom +he wished to hold up to the derision or hatred of his countrymen. +Most of these poems were called forth by real occurrences, +and express, without disguise, his genuine feelings at +the time: His contempt, dislike, and resentment, all burst +out in poetry. So little is known concerning the circumstances +of his life, or the history of his enmities or friendships, +that some of the lighter productions of Catullus are nearly +unintelligible, while others appear flat and obscure; and in +none can we fully relish the felicity of expression or allusion. +</p> + +<p> +These epigrams of Catullus are chiefly curious and valuable, +when considered as occasional or extemporary productions, +which paint the manners, as well as echo the tone of thought +and feeling, which at the time prevailed in fashionable society +at Rome. What chiefly obtrudes itself on our attention, is the +gross personal invective, and indecency of these compositions, +so foreign from anything that would be tolerated in modern +times. The art of rendering others satisfied with themselves, +and consequently with us—the practice of dissembling our +feelings, at first to please, and then by habit,—the custom, if +not of flattering our foes, at least of meeting those we dislike, +without reviling them, were talents unknown in the ancient +<pb n="316"/><anchor id="Pg316"/>republic of Rome. The freedom of the times was accompanied +by a frankness and sincerity of language, which we +would consider as rude. Even the best friends attacked each +other in the Senate, and before the various tribunals of justice, +in the harshest and most unmeasured terms of abuse. Philip +of Macedon, in an amicable interview with the Roman general +Flaminius, who was accounted the most polite man of his +day, apologized for not having returned an immediate answer +to some proposition which had been made to him, on the +ground that none of those friends, with whom he was in the +habit of consulting, were at hand when he received it; to +which Flaminius replied, that the reason he had no friends +near him was, that he had assassinated them all. Matters +were little better in the days of Catullus. At the time he +flourished, everything was made subservient to political advancement; +and what <hi rend="italic">we</hi> should consider as the most inexpiable +offences, were forgotten, or at least forgiven, as soon +as the interests of ambition required. Accordingly, no person +seems to have blamed the bitter invectives of Catullus; and +none of his contemporaries were surprised or shocked at the +unbridled freedom with which he reviled his enemies. He +was merely considered as availing himself of a privilege, +which every one was entitled to exercise. In his days, ridicule +and raillery were oftener directed by malice than by wit: +But the Romans thought no terms unseemly, which expressed +the utmost bitterness of private or political animosity, and an +excess of malevolence was received as sufficient compensation +for deficiency in liveliness or humour. As little were the +Romans offended by the obscene images and expressions +which Catullus so frequently employed. Such had not yet +been proscribed in the conversation of the best company. +<q>Among the ancients,</q> says Porson, in his review of Brunck’s +<hi rend="italic">Aristophanes</hi><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tracts</hi>, p. 13.</note>, <q>plain speaking was the fashion; nor was that +ceremonious delicacy introduced, which has taught men to +abuse each other with the utmost politeness, and express the +most indecent ideas in the most modest language. The +ancients had little of this: They were accustomed to call a +spade, a spade—to give everything its proper name. There +is another sort of indecency which is infinitely more dangerous, +which corrupts the heart without offending the ear.</q> +Hence the Muse of light poetry thought not of having recourse +to the circumlocutions or suggestions of modern times. +Nor did Catullus suffer in his reputation, either as an author +or man of fashion, from the impurities by which his poems +<pb n="317"/><anchor id="Pg317"/>were poisoned. All this would have been less remarkable in +the first age of Roman literature, as indelicacy of expression +is characteristic of the early poetry of almost every nation. +The French epigrams of Regnier, and his contemporaries +Motin and Berthelot, are nearly as gross as those of Catullus; +but at the close of the Roman republic, literature was far advanced; +and if it be true, that as a nation grows corrupted its +language becomes pure, the words and expressions of the +Romans, in these last days of liberty, should have been sufficiently +chaste. The obscenities of Catullus, however, it must be +admitted, are oftener the sport of satire, than the ebullitions of +a voluptuous imagination. His sarcastic account of the debaucheries +of Lesbia, is more impure than the pictures of his +enjoyment of her love. +</p> + +<p> +No subject connected with the works of Catullus is more +curious than the different sentiments, which, as we have seen, +he expresses with regard to this woman. His conflict of +mind breathes into his poetry every variety of passion. We +behold him now transported with love, now reviling and despising +her as sunk in the lowest abyss of shame, and yet, +with this full knowledge of her abandoned character, her +blandishments preserve undiminished sway over his affections. +<q>At one time,</q> says a late translator of Catullus, <q>we find +him upbraiding Lesbia bitterly with her licentiousness, then +bidding her farewell for ever; then beseeching from the gods +resolution to cast her off; then weakly confessing utter impotence +of mind, and submission to hopeless slavery; then, in +the epistle to Manlius, persuading himself, by reason and example, +into a contented acquiescence in her falsehoods, and +yet at last accepting with eagerness, and relying with hope, +on her proffered vow of constancy. Nothing can be more +genuine than the rapture with which he depicts his happiness +in her hours of affection; nor than the gloomy despair with +which he is overwhelmed, when he believes himself resolved +to quit her for ever.</q> And all this, he wrote and circulated +concerning a Roman lady, belonging, it is believed, to one +of the first and most powerful families of the state! +</p> + +<p> +Lesbia, as formerly mentioned, is universally allowed to be +Clodia, the sister of the turbulent Clodius; but there has been +a great deal of discussion and dispute, with regard to the +identity of the other individuals against whom the epigrams +are directed. Justus Lipsius<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Var. Lect.</hi> Lib. III. c. 5.</note> has written a dissertation with +regard to Vettius and Cominius. The former he supposes to +be the person mentioned in Cicero’s Letters to Atticus, and +<pb n="318"/><anchor id="Pg318"/>by Suetonius, as having been suborned by Cæsar, to allow +himself to be seized with a weapon on his person, and to +confess that he had been employed by the Chiefs of the Senate +to assassinate Pompey—a device contrived by Cæsar, in +order to set Pompey and the Senate at variance. Cominius +was an accuser by profession, and impeached C. Cornelius, +whom Cicero defended<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 78.</note>. Lipsius believes Alphenus to be +Pompey, and thinks that the epigram, directed against him, is +supposed to be written in the person of Cicero. He is of +opinion that the poet durst not venture to mention Pompey’s +name, and therefore designed him by an assumed one; but +the epigrams on Julius Cæsar prove that Catullus was neither +so scrupulous nor timid. The greatest number, however, and +the most cutting of the epigrams, are aimed at Gellius, his +successful rival in the affections of Lesbia— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Quem Lesbia malit,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quam te cum totâ gente, Catulle, tuâ.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There were two persons of this name at Rome in the time of +Catullus—an uncle and nephew. The first was a notorious +profligate, who had wasted his patrimony, and afterwards +headed mobs in the Forum for hire<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Orat. pro Sextio</hi>, c. 51.</note>. The nephew was equally +dissolute. After the death of Cæsar, he conspired to assassinate +Cassius in the midst of his army, and, having been pardoned, +deserted to Antony. One of the various crimes of +which he was suspected, identifies him as the Gellius branded +by our poet, and whose vices were so great— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Quantum non ultima Tethys,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Non genitor nympharum abluit Oceanus.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This idea, by the way, of crimes of such crimson dye that +they cannot be washed out by the wide world of waters, seems +to have been originally derived from some verses of the chorus +in the Choephoræ of Æschylus— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">ποροι τε παντες ἐκ μιας ὁδου</foreign><!--[Greek: poroi te pantes ek mias hodou--></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Βαινοντες τον χαιρομυσου</foreign><!--Bainontes ton chairomysou--></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Φονον καθαιροντες ἰουσαν ατην.</foreign><!--Phonon kathairontes iousan atên].--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The great successor of Æschylus expressed the same idea, in +different language, in the <hi rend="italic">Œdipus Tyrannus</hi>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Ὀιμαι γαρ ὀυτ’ αν Ιστρον ὀυτε Φασιν αν</foreign><!--[Greek: Oimai gar out' an Istron oute Phasin an --></q></l> +<l><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Νιψαι καθαρμω τηνδε στεγην, ὁσα</foreign><!--Nipsai katharmô tênde stegên, hosa --></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none"><foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Κευθει.</foreign><!--Keuthei].--></q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="319"/><anchor id="Pg319"/> + +<p> +Seneca, imitating Catullus, in his <hi rend="italic">Hercules Furens</hi>, says— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l rend="margin-left: 3">—— <q rend="post: none">Arctoum licet</q></l> +<l>Mæotis in me gelida transfundat mare,</l> +<l>Et tota Thetis per meas currat manus,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Hærebit altum facinus.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +There is a remarkable resemblance betwixt this idea and a +well-known passage in <hi rend="italic">Macbeth</hi>: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Clean from my hand?</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Much dispute has existed with regard to the comparative +merit of the epigrammatic productions of Catullus, and those +of Martial, who sharpened the Latin epigram, and endeavoured +to surprise, by terminating an ordinary thought with +some word or expression, which formed a <hi rend="italic">point</hi>. Of the three +great triumvirs of Latin literature, Joseph Scaliger, Lipsius, +and Muretus, the last considers Catullus as far superior to his +successor, as the wit of a gentleman to that of a scoffer and +buffoon, while the two former award the palm to Martial. +Their respective merits are very well summed up by Vavassor.—<q>Catullum +quidem, puro ac simplici candore, et nativa quadam, +minimeque adscita, excellere venustate formæ, quæ accedat +quam proxime ad Græcos. Martialem acumine, quod +proprium Latinorum, et peculiare tunc fieri cœpit, valere; +adeoque Catullum toto corpore epigrammatis esse conspicuum, +Martialem clausula præcipue, atque ultimo fine, in quo relinquat, +cum delectatione, aculeum spectari<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Ludicrâ Dictione</hi>.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +There can, I think, be no doubt, that, as an epigrammatist, +Martial is infinitely superior to Catullus; but it is not on his +epigrams that the fame of Catullus rests: He owes his reputation +to about a dozen pieces, in which every word, like a +note of music, thrills on the heart-strings. It is this felicitous +selection of the most <anchor id="corr319"/><corr sic="appropiate">appropriate</corr> and melodious expressions, +which seem to flow from the heart without study or premeditation, +which has rendered him the most <hi rend="italic">graceful</hi> of poets:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l>—— <q rend="post: none">Ce naif agrement,</q></l> +<l>Ce ton de cœur, ce negligé charmant,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Qui le rendit le poëte <hi rend="italic">des Graces</hi><note place="foot">Gresset.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Few poets, besides, have shown more freshness in their conceptions—more +truth and nature in their delineations of +amatory passion—more heartfelt tenderness in grief—and +<pb n="320"/><anchor id="Pg320"/>none, certainly, ever possessed a more happy art of embellishing +trivial incidents, by the manner in which he treated +them. Indeed, the most exquisite of his productions, in point +of grace and delicacy, are those which were called forth by +the most trifling occasions; while, at the same time, his Epithalamium +of Peleus and Thetis proves, that he was by no +means deficient in that warmth of imagination, energy of +thought, and sublimity of conception, which form the attributes +of perfection in those bards who tread the higher paths +of Parnassus. Catullus is a great favourite with all the early +critics and commentators of the 16th century. The elder +Scaliger alone has pronounced on him a harsh and unmerited +sentence: <q>Catullo,</q> says he, <q>docti nomen quare sit ab antiquis +attributum, neque apud alios comperi, neque dum in +mentem venit mihi. Nihil enim non vulgare est in ejus libris: +ejus autem syllabæ cùm duræ sint, tum ipse non raro durus; +aliquando vero adeo mollis, ut fluat, neque consistat. Multa +impudica, quorum pudet—multa languida, quorum miseret—multa +coacta, quorum piget<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Poetic.</hi> Lib. VI. c. 7.</note>.</q> In conclusion, the reader +may, perhaps, like to hear the opinion of the pure and saintly +Fenelon, concerning this obscene pagan.—<q rend="post: none">Catulle, qu’on ne +peut nommer sans avoir horreur de ses obscenitéz, est au +comble de la perfection pour une simplicité passionnée—</q> +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l>‘Odi et amo: quare id faciam fortasse requiris.</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Nescio; sed fieri sentio, et excrucior.’</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +<q rend="pre: none">Combien Ovide et Martial, avec leurs traits ingenieux et +façonnéz, sont ils au dessous de ces paroles negligées, ou le +cœur saisi parle seul dans un espéce de désespoir.</q> +</p> + +<p> +The different sorts of poetry which Catullus, though not +their inventor, first introduced at Rome, were cultivated and +brought to high perfection by his countrymen. Horace followed, +and excelled him in Lyric compositions. The elegiac +measure was adopted with success by Ovid, Tibullus, and +Propertius, and applied by them to the expression of amatory +sentiments, which, if they did not reach the refinement, or +pure devotedness of the middle ages<note place="foot">There is more tenderness and delicacy in a single love-verse of an old Troubadour, +than in all the amatory compositions of the Greeks and Romans. What is +there in Anacreon or Ovid, to compare to these verses of Thibault, King of Navarre?— + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Las! Si j’avois pouvoir d’oublier,</q></l> +<l>Sa beaulté—son bien dire,</l> +<l>Et son très doulx regarder,</l> +<l>Finirois non martyre.</l> +</lg><lg> +<l><q rend="post: none">Mais las! Comment oublier</q></l> +<l>Sa beaulté, son bien dire,</l> +<l>Et son très doulx regarder!</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Mieux aime mon martyre.</q></l> +</lg></note>, were less gross than +those of Catullus. +</p> + +<pb n="321"/><anchor id="Pg321"/> + +<p> +In his epigrammatic compositions, Catullus was imitated by +several of his own contemporaries, most of whom also ranked +in the number of his friends. Their works, however, have +almost entirely perished. Quintus Lutatius Catulus, who is +praised as an orator and historian by Cicero<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Brutus</hi>, c. 35.</note>, has left two +epigrams—one, <hi rend="italic">Ad Theotimum</hi>, translated from Callimachus, +the name Theotimus being merely substituted for that of +Cephissus—and the other, <hi rend="italic">Ad Roscium Puerum</hi>, addressed +to the celebrated actor in his youth, and quoted by Cicero in +his treatise, <hi rend="italic">De Naturâ Deorum</hi><note place="foot"><q>Hic illi, (Catulo) Deo pulchrior,</q> says Cicero, <q>at erat, sicut hodie est, +perversissimis oculis.</q> Lib. I. c. 28.</note>— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Constiteram, exorientem Auroram forte salutans;</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Cum subito a lævâ Roscius exoritur.</l> +<l>Pace mihi liceat, Cœlestes, dicere vestrâ;</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Mortalis visus pulchrior esse deo<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">I stood, and to the Dawn my vows addressed,</q></l> +<l>When Roscius rose refulgent in the west.</l> +<l>Forgive, ye Powers! A mortal seemed more bright,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Than the bright god who darts the shafts of light.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This epigram formed a theme and subject of poetical contest +among the French <hi rend="italic">beaux esprits</hi> of the 17th century, who +vied with each other in sonnets and madrigals, entitled <hi rend="italic">La +Belle Matineuse</hi>, written in imitation of the above verses. One +will suffice as a specimen— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">La Belle Matineuse.</hi></l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Le silence régnait sur la terre et sur l’onde,</q></l> +<l>L’air devenait serein, et l’Olympe vermeil,</l> +<l>Et l’amoureux Zephyr affranchi du sommeil</l> +<l>Ressuscitait les fleurs d’une haleine féconde.</l> +<l>L’Aurore déployait l’or de sa tresse blonde,</l> +<l>Et semait de rubis le chemin du soleil.</l> +<l>Enfin ce Dieu venait au plus grand appareil,</l> +<l>Qu’il fût jamais venus pour éclairer le monde.</l> +<l>Quand la jeune Philis au visage riant,</l> +<l>Sortant de son palais, plus clair que l’Orient,</l> +<l>Fit voir une lumière et plus vive et plus belle.</l> +<l>Sacre flambeau de jour, n’en soyez point jaloux;</l> +<l>Vous parûtes alors aussi peu devant elle,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Que les feux de la nuit avoient fait devant vous.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +From a vast collection of Italian sonnets on the same subject, +I select one by Annibal Caro, the celebrated translator +of Virgil— +</p> + +<pb n="322"/><anchor id="Pg322"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Eran l’aer tranquillo, e l’onde chiare,</q></l> +<l>Sospirava Favonio, e fuggia Clori,</l> +<l>L’alma Ciprigna innanzi ai primi albori</l> +<l>Ridendo empia d’amor la terra e ’l mare.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">La rugiadosa Aurora in ciel più rare</q></l> +<l>Facea le stelle; e di più bei colori</l> +<l>Sparse le nubi, e i monti; uscia già fuori</l> +<l>Febo, qual più lucente in Delfo appare.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quando altra Aurora un più vezzoso ostello</q></l> +<l>Aperse, e lampeggiò sereno, e puro</l> +<l>Il Sol, che sol m’abbaglia, e mi disface.</l> +</lg> + +<lg> + <l><q rend="post: none">Volsimi, e ’n contro a lei mi parve oscuro,</q></l> +<l>(Santi lumi del ciel, con vostra pace)</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">L’Oriente, che dianzi era si bello.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Licinius Calvus was equally distinguished as an orator and +a poet. In the former capacity he is mentioned with distinction +by Cicero; but it was probably his poetical talents that +procured for him the friendship of Catullus, who has addressed +to him two Odes, in which he is commemorated as a most +delightful companion, from whose society he could scarcely +refrain. Calvus was violently enamoured of a girl called +Quintilia, whose early death he lamented in a number of verses, +none of which have descended to us. There only remain, +an epigram against Pompey, satirizing his practice of scratching +his head with one finger, and a fragment of another +against Julius Cæsar<note place="foot">Sueton. <hi rend="italic">In Jul. Cæsare</hi>, c. 49.</note>. The sarcasm it contains would not +have been pardonable in the present age; but the dictator, +hearing that Calvus had repented of his petulance, and was +desirous of a reconciliation, addressed a letter to him, with +assurances of unaltered friendship<note place="foot">Ibid. c. 73.</note>. The fragments of his +epigrams which remain, do not enable us to judge for ourselves +of his poetical merits. He is classed by Ovid among the +licentious writers<note place="foot">Ovid. <hi rend="italic">Tristia</hi>, Lib. II.</note>; but he is generally mentioned along with +Catullus, which shows that he was not considered as greatly +inferior to his friend— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Nil præter Calvum et doctus cantare Catullum.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Pliny, in one of his letters, talking of his friend Pompeius Saturnius, +mentions, that he had composed several poetical pieces +in the manner of Calvus and Catullus<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. I. ep. 16.</note>; and Augurinus, as +quoted by Pliny in another of his epistles, says, +</p> + +<pb n="323"/><anchor id="Pg323"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Canto carmina versibus minutis</q></l> +<l>His olim quibus et meus Catullus,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Et Calvus ——</q><note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> Lib. IV. ep. 27.</note></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Valerius Ædituus"/><index index="pdf" level1="Valerius Aedituus"/> +<head>VALERIUS ÆDITUUS,</head> + +<p> +Of Valerius Ædituus, another writer of epigrams and amorous +verses in the time of Catullus, little is known; but +the following lines by him, to a slave carrying a torch before +him to the house of his mistress, have been quoted by Aulus +Gellius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quid faculam præfers, Phileros, qua nil opu’ nobis?</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Ibimus, hoc lucet pectore flamma satis.</l> +<l>Istam nam potis est vis sæva extinguere venti,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Aut imber cœlo candidus præcipitans:</l> +<l>At contra, hunc ignem Veneris, nisi si Venus ipsa,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Nulla ’st quæ possit vis alia opprimere<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Why Phileros, a torch before me bear?—</q></l> +<l>A heart on fire all other light may spare.</l> +<l><hi rend="italic">That</hi> feeble flame can ill resist the power</l> +<l>Of the keen tempest and the headlong shower;</l> +<l>But <hi rend="italic">this</hi> still glows whatever storms may drench,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">What Venus kindles, she alone can quench.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Aulus Gellius has also preserved the following verses of Porcius +Licinius— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Custodes ovium, teneræque propaginis agnûm,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2">Quæris ignem?—Ite huc: quæritis? ignis homo est.</l> +<l>Si digito attigero, incendam silvam simul omnem,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Omne pecus: flamma ’st omnia quæ video<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Ye guardians of the tender flock, retire,</q></l> +<l>Why seek ye flames, when man himself is fire?</l> +<l>Whate’er I touch bursts forth in sudden blaze,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">And the woods kindle with my scorching gaze.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +During the period in which the works of Lucretius and +Catullus brought the Latin language to such perfection, the +drama, which we have seen so highly elevated in the days of +the Scipios, had sunk into a state of comparative degradation. +National circumstances and manners had never been favourable +to the progress of the dramatic art at Rome; but, subsequently +to the conquest of Carthage, the increasing size and +magnificence of the Roman theatres, some of which held not +less than 60,000 people, required splendid spectacles, or extravagant +buffoonery, to fill the eye, and catch the attention +of a crowded, and often tumultuous assembly. +</p> + +<p> +Accordingly, in the long period from the termination of the +<pb n="324"/><anchor id="Pg324"/>Punic wars till the Augustan age, there scarcely appeared a single +successor to Plautus or Pacuvius. That the pieces of the +ancient tragic or comic writers still continued to be occasionally +represented, is evident from the immense wealth amassed, +in the time of Cicero, by Æsopus and Roscius, who never, so +far as we know, condescended to appear, except in the regular +drama; but a new tragedy or comedy was rarely brought out. +This deficiency in the fund of entertainment and novelty, in +the province of the legitimate drama, was supplied by the +<hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Mimes</hi>, which now became fashionable in Rome. +</p> + +<p> +Though resembling them in name, the Latin Mimes differed +essentially from the Greek <foreign rend="Greek" lang="el">Μιμοι</foreign><!--[Greek: Mimoi]-->, from which they derived their +appellation. The Greek Mimes, of which Sophron of Syracuse +was the chief writer, represented a single adventure +taken from ordinary life, and exhibited characters without any +gross caricature or buffoonery. The fifteenth Idyl of Theocritus +is said to be written in the manner of the Greek Mimes<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Theorie</hi>, Tom. I. <hi rend="italic">Comödie</hi>.</note>; +and, to judge from it, they were not so much actions as conversations +with regard to some action which was supposed to +be going on at the time, and is pointed out, as it were, by the +one interlocutor to the other, or an imitation of the action, +whence their name has been derived. They resembled detached +or unconnected scenes of a comedy, and required no +more gesticulation or mimetic art, than is employed in all +dramatic representations. On the other hand, mimetic gestures +of every species, except dancing, were essential to the +Roman Mimes, as also the exhibition of grotesque characters, +which had often no prototypes in real life. The Mimes of the +Romans, again, differed from their pantomime in this, that, in +the former, most of the gestures were accompanied by recitation, +whereas the pantomimic entertainments, carried to such +perfection by Pylades and Bathyllus, were <hi rend="italic">ballets</hi>, often of a +serious, and never of a ludicrous or grotesque description, in +which everything was expressed by dumb show, and in which +dancing constituted so considerable a part of the amusement, +that the performers danced a poem, a chorus, or whole drama, +(<hi rend="italic">Canticum saltabant</hi>.) +</p> + +<p> +It is much more difficult to distinguish the Mimes from the +<hi rend="italic">Fabulæ Atellanæ</hi>, than from the Pantomimes or Greek <hi rend="italic">Mimi</hi>; +and indeed they have been frequently confounded<note place="foot"><q>Non ignoro,</q> says Salmasius, in his Notes to Vopiscus’ Life of Aurelian, <q>quid +distent Atellanæ et Mimi; recentiores, tamen, confudisse videntur.</q> F. Vopiscus, +<hi rend="italic">Vit. Aurel.</hi> c. 42. ap. <hi rend="italic">Histor. August. Script.</hi></note>. It appears, +however, that the characters represented in the Atellane +dramas were chiefly provincial, while those introduced in the +<pb n="325"/><anchor id="Pg325"/>Mimes were the lowest class of citizens at Rome. Antic gestures, +too, were more employed in the Mimes than the Atellane +fables, and they were more obscene and ludicrous: <q>Toti,</q> +says Vossius, <q>erant ridiculi.</q> The Atellanes, though full of +mirth, were always tempered with something of the ancient +Italian severity, and consisted of a more liberal and polite kind +of humour than the Mimes. In this respect Cicero places the +Mimes and Atellane fables in contrast, in a letter to Papyrius +Pætus, where he says, that the broad jests in which his correspondent +had indulged, immediately after having quoted the +tragedy of Œnomaus, reminds him of the modern method of +introducing, at the end of such graver dramatic pieces, the +buffoonery of the Mimes, instead of the more delicate humour +of the old Atellane farces<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Epist. Familiar.</hi> Lib. IX. ep. 16.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +These Mimes, (which, with the Atellane fables, and regular +tragedy and comedy, form the four great branches of the Roman +drama,) were represented by actors, who sometimes wore +masks, but more frequently had their faces stained like our +clowns or mountebanks. There was always one principal +actor, on whom the jests and ridicule chiefly hinged. The +second, or inferior parts, were entirely subservient to that of +the first performer: They were merely introduced to set him +off to advantage, to imitate his actions, and take up his words— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Sic iterat voces, et verba cadentia tollit;</q></l> +<l>Ut puerum sævo credas dictata magistro</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Reddere, vel partes mimum tractare secundas.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Some writers have supposed, that a Mime was a sort of <hi rend="italic">monodrame</hi>, +and that the <hi rend="italic">partes secundæ</hi>, here alluded to by Horace, +meant the part of the actor who gesticulated<note place="foot">Flogel, <hi rend="italic">Geschichte der komisch. Litter.</hi> T. IV. p. 101. Müller, <hi rend="italic">Einleitung</hi>.</note>, while the other +declaimed, or that of the declaimer<note place="foot">Donatus, <hi rend="italic">Præf. in Terent.</hi></note>. It is quite evident, +however, from the context of the lines, that Horace refers to +the inferior characters of the Mime<note place="foot">Hoffmanni, <hi rend="italic">Lexicon, voce Mimus</hi>. Ziegler, <hi rend="italic">De Mimis Romanorum</hi>, p. 21, +ed. Gotting. 1789.</note>. I doubt not that the +chief performer assumed more than one character in the +course of the piece<note place="foot">Manilius, <hi rend="italic">De Astronomic.</hi> Lib. V. v. 472.</note>, in the manner in which the Admirable +Crichton is recorded to have performed at the court of +Mantua<note place="foot">Tytler’s <hi rend="italic">Life of Crichton</hi>, p. 45. 1st ed.</note>; but there were also subordinate parts in the Mime—a +fool or a parasite, who assisted in carrying on the jests or +tricks of his principal:—<q>C. Volumnius,</q> says Festus, <q>qui +<pb n="326"/><anchor id="Pg326"/>ad tibicinem saltârit, secundarum partium fuerit, qui, fere +omnibus Mimis, parasitus inducatur<note place="foot">Festus in <hi rend="italic">Salva res est</hi>.</note>;</q> and to the same purpose +Petronius Arbiter,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Grex agit in scenâ Mimum—Pater ille vocatur,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 4"><q rend="pre: none">Filius hic, nomen Divitis ille tenet<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satyricon</hi>, c. 80. See also Suetonius, <hi rend="italic">Caligula</hi>, c. 57.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The performance of a Mime commenced with the appearance +of the chief actor, who explained its subject in a sort of +prologue, in order that the spectators might fully understand +what was but imperfectly represented by words or gestures. +This prolocutor, also, was generally the author of a sketch of +the piece; but the actors were not confined to the mere outline +which he had furnished. In one view, the province of the +mimetic actor was of a higher description than that of the +regular comedian. He was obliged to trust not so much +to memory as invention, and to clothe in extemporaneous +effusions of his own, those rude sketches of dramatic scenes, +which were all that were presented to him by his author. +The performers of Mimes, however, too often gave full scope, +not merely to natural unpremeditated gaiety, but abandoned +themselves to every sort of extravagant and indecorous action. +The part written out was in iambic verse, but the extemporary +dialogue which filled up the scene was in prose, or in the +rudest species of versification. Through the course of the +exhibition, the want of refinement or dramatic interest was +supplied by the excellence of the mimetic part, and the +amusing imitation of the peculiarities or personal habits of +various classes of society. The performers were seldom +anxious to give a reasonable conclusion to their extravagant +intrigue. Sometimes, when they could not extricate themselves +from the embarrassment into which they had thrown +each other, they simultaneously rushed off the stage, and the +performance terminated<note place="foot"><q>Mimi ergo est jam exitus,</q> says Cicero, <q>non Fabulæ: In quo, cum clausula +non invenitur, fugit aliquis e manibus; deinde scabella concrepant, aulæum tollitur.</q>—<hi rend="italic">Orat. +pro Cælio</hi>, c. 27.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The characters exhibited were parts taken from the dregs +of the populace—courtezans, thieves, and drunkards. The +Sannio, or Zany, seems to have been common to the Mimes +and Atellane dramas. He excited laughter by lolling out his +tongue, and making asses’ ears on his head with his fingers. +There was also the Panniculus, who appeared in a party-coloured +dress, with his head shaved, feigning stupidity or +folly, and allowing blows to be inflicted on himself without +<pb n="327"/><anchor id="Pg327"/>cause or moderation. That women performed characters in +these dramas, and were often the favourite mistresses of the +great, is evident from a passage in the Satires of Horace, who +mentions a female Mime, called Origo, on whom a wealthy +Roman had lavished his paternal inheritance<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Sat.</hi> Lib. I. 2. v. 55.</note>. Cornelius +Gallus wrote four books of <hi rend="italic">Elegies</hi> in praise of a Mime called +Cytheris, who, as Aurelius Victor informs us, was also beloved +by Antony and Brutus—<q>Cytheridam Mimam, cum Antonio +et Gallo, amavit Brutus.</q> It appears from a passage in Valerius +Maximus, that these Mimæ were often required to strip +themselves of their clothes in presence of the spectators<note place="foot">Lib. II. c. 5.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +As might be expected from the characters introduced, the +Mimes were appropriated to a representation of the lowest +follies and debaucheries of the vulgar. <q>Argumenta,</q> says +Valerius Maximus, <q>majore ex parte, stuprorum continent +actus.</q> That they were in a great measure occupied with +the tricks played by wives on their husbands, (somewhat, probably, +in the style of those related by the Italian novelists,) +we learn from Ovid; who, after complaining in his <hi rend="italic">Tristia</hi> of +having been undeservedly condemned for the freedom of his +verses, asks— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quid si scripsissem Mimos obscœna jocantes?</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 3">Qui semper juncti crimen amoris habent;</l> +<l>In quibus assidue cultus procedit adulter,</l> +<l rend="margin-left: 3"><q rend="pre: none">Verbaque dat stulto callida nupta viro<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Tristia</hi>, Lib. II. v. 497.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +We learn from another passage of Ovid that these were by +much the most popular subjects,— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Cumque fefellit amans aliquâ novitate maritum,</q></l> +<l rend="margin-left: 2"><q rend="pre: none">Plauditur, et magno palma favore datur.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The same poet elsewhere calls the Mimes, <q>Imitantes turpia +Mimos;</q> and Diomedes defines them to be <q>Sermonis cujuslibet, +motûsque, sine reverentiâ, vel factorum turpium cum +lasciviâ imitatio, ita ut ridiculum faciant.</q> +</p> + +<p> +These Mimes were originally represented as a sort of afterpiece, +or interlude to the regular dramas, and were intended +to fill up the blank which had been left by omission of the +Chorus. But they subsequently came to form a separate and +fashionable public amusement, which in a great measure superseded +all other dramatic entertainments. Sylla (in whom the +gloomy temper of the tyrant was brightened by the talents of +a mimic and a wit) was so fond of Mimes, that he gave the +<pb n="328"/><anchor id="Pg328"/>actors of them many acres of the public land<note place="foot">Athenæus, <hi rend="italic">Deipnos.</hi> Lib. VI.</note>; and we shall soon +see the high importance which Julius Cæsar attached to this +sort of spectacle. It appears, at first view, curious, that the +Romans—the most grave, solid, and dignified nation on earth, +the <hi rend="italic">gens togata</hi>, and the <hi rend="italic">domini rerum</hi>—should have been so +partial to the exhibition of licentious buffoonery on the stage. +But, perhaps, when people have a mind to divert themselves, +they choose what is most different from their ordinary temper +and habits, as being most likely to amuse them. <q>Strangely,</q> +says Isaac Bey, while relating his adventures in <hi rend="italic">France</hi>, <q>was +my poor Turkish brain puzzled, on discovering the favourite +pastime of a nation reckoned the merriest in the world. It consisted +in a thing called tragedies, whose only purpose is to +make you cry your eyes out. Should the performance raise +a single smile, the author is undone<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Anastasius</hi>, Vol. II. p. 385. 2d ed.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +The popularity and frequent repetition of the Mimes came +gradually to purify their grossness; and the writers of them, +at length, were not contented merely with the fame of amusing +the Roman populace by ribaldry. They carried their pretensions +higher; and, while they sometimes availed themselves +of the licentious freedom to which this species of drama gave +unlimited indulgence, they interspersed the most striking truths +and beautiful moral maxims in these ludicrous and indecent +farces. This appears from the Mimes of <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Decimus Laberius</hi> +and <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Publius Syrus</hi>, who both flourished during the dictatorship +of Julius Cæsar. +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Laberius"/><index index="pdf" level1="Laberius"/> +<head>LABERIUS.</head> + +<p> +In earlier periods, as has been already mentioned, the writer +was also the chief representer of the Mime. Laberius, however, +was not originally an actor, but a Roman knight of +respectable family and character, who occasionally amused +himself with the composition of these farcical productions. +He was at length requested by Julius Cæsar to appear on the +stage after he had reached the age of sixty, and act the +Mimes, which he had sketched or written<note place="foot">Macrobius, <hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi>, Lib. II. c. 7.</note>. Aware that the +entreaties of a perpetual dictator are nearly equivalent to +commands, he reluctantly complied; but in the prologue to +the first piece which he acted, he complained bitterly to the +audience of the degradation to which he had been subjected— +</p> + +<pb n="329"/><anchor id="Pg329"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Ego, bis trecenis annis actis, sine notâ,</q></l> +<l>Eques Romanus lare egressus meo,</l> +<l>Domum revertar Mimus. Nimirum hoc die</l> +<l>Uno plus vixi mihi, quàm vivendum fuit.</l> +<l>Fortuna, immoderata in bono æque atque in malo,</l> +<l>Si tibi erat libitum, literarum laudibus</l> +<l>Floris cacumen nostræ famæ frangere,</l> +<l>Cur cum vigebam membris præ viridantibus,</l> +<l>Satisfacere populo, et tali cum poteram viro,</l> +<l>Non flexibilem me concurvàsti ut caperes?</l> +<l>Nunc me quo dejicis? quid ad scenam affero,</l> +<l>Decorem formæ, an dignitatem corporis?</l> +<l>Animi virtutem, an vocis jucundæ sonum?</l> +<l>Ut hedera serpens vires arboreas necat;</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ita me vetustas amplexu annorum enecat<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">For threescore years since first I saw the light,</q></l> +<l>I lived without reproach—<hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">A Roman Knight</hi>.</l> +<l>As such I left my sacred home; but soon</l> +<l>Shall there return an actor and buffoon.</l> +<l>Since stretch’d beyond the point where honour ends,</l> +<l>One day too long my term of life extends.</l> +<l>Fortune, extreme alike in good and ill,</l> +<l>Since thus to blast my fame has been thy will;</l> +<l>Why didst thou not, ere spent my youthful race,</l> +<l>Bend me yet pliant to this dire disgrace?</l> +<l>While power remain’d, with yet unbroken frame,</l> +<l><hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">Him</hi> to have pleased, and earn’d the crowd’s acclaim:</l> +<l>But now why drive me to an actor’s part,</l> +<l>When nought remains of all the actor’s art;</l> +<l>Nor life, nor fire, which could the scene rejoice,</l> +<l>Nor grace of form, nor harmony of voice?</l> +<l>As fades the tree round which the ivy twines,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">So in the clasp of age my strength declines.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The whole prologue, consisting of twenty-nine lines, which +have been preserved by Macrobius, is written in a fine vein of +poetry, and with all the high spirit of a Roman citizen. It +breathes in every verse the most bitter and indignant feelings +of wounded pride, and highly exalts our opinion of the man, +who, yielding to an irresistible power, preserved his dignity +while performing a part which he despised. It is difficult to +conceive how, in this frame of mind, he could assume the +jocund and unrestrained gaiety of a Mime, or how the Roman +people could relish so painful a spectacle. He is said, however, +to have represented the feigned character with inimitable +grace and spirit. But in the course of his performance he +could not refrain from expressing strong sentiments of freedom +and detestation of tyranny. In one of the scenes he +personated a Syrian slave; and, while escaping from the lash +of his master, he exclaimed, +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Porro, Quirites, libertatem perdidimus;</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +and shortly after, he added, +</p> + +<pb n="330"/><anchor id="Pg330"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Necesse est multos timeat, quem multi timent,</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +on which the whole audience turned their eyes to Cæsar, who +was present in the theatre<note place="foot">Macrobius, <hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi>, Lib. II. c. 7.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +It was not merely to entertain the people, who would have +been as well amused with the representation of any other +actor; nor to wound the private feelings of Laberius, that +Cæsar forced him on the stage. His sole object was to degrade +the Roman knighthood, to subdue their spirit of independence +and honour, and to strike the people with a sense of his unlimited +sway. This policy formed part of the same system which +afterwards led him to persuade a senator to combat among +the ranks of gladiators. The practice introduced by Cæsar +became frequent during the reigns of his successors; and in +the time of Domitian, the Fabii and Mamerci acted as <hi rend="italic">planipedes</hi>, +the lowest class of buffoons, who, barefooted and +smeared with soot, capered about the stage in the intervals +of the play for the amusement of the rabble! +</p> + +<p> +Though Laberius complied with the wishes of Cæsar, in +exhibiting himself on the stage, and acquitted himself with +ability as a mimetic actor, it would appear that the Dictator +had been hurt and offended by the freedoms which he used +in the course of the representation, and either on this or some +subsequent occasion bestowed the dramatic crown on a Syrian +slave, in preference to the Roman knight. Laberius submitted +with good grace to this fresh humiliation; he pretended to +regard it merely as the ordinary chance of theatric competition, +as he expressed to the audience in the following lines:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Non possunt primi esse omnes omni in tempore.</q></l> +<l>Summum ad gradum cum claritatis veneris,</l> +<l>Consistes ægre: et citius quam ascendas, decides.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Cecidi ego—cadet qui sequitur<note place="foot"><lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">All are not always first—few have been known</q></l> +<l>To rest long on the summit of renown.</l> +<l>In fame we faster fall than we ascend:</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">I fall—who follows, thus his course must end.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> +</note>.</q> ——</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +Laberius did not long survive this double mortification: he +retired from Rome, and died at Puteoli about ten months after +the assassination of Cæsar<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Chron. Euseb. ad Olymp.</hi> 184.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The titles and a few fragments of forty-three of the Mimes +of Laberius are still extant; but, excepting the prologue, +these remains are too inconsiderable and detached to enable +us to judge of their subject or merits. It would appear that +he occasionally dramatized the passing follies or absurd oc<pb n="331"/><anchor id="Pg331"/>currences of the day: for Cicero, writing to the lawyer Trebonius, +who expected to accompany Cæsar from Gaul to +Britain, tells him he had best return to Rome quickly, as a +longer pursuit to no purpose would be so ridiculous a circumstance, +that it would hardly escape the drollery of that arch +fellow Laberius; and what a burlesque character, he continues, +would a British lawyer furnish out for the Roman stage<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist. Famil.</hi> Lib. VII. ep. 11.</note>! +The only passage of sufficient length in connection to give us +any idea of his manner, is a whimsical application of a story +concerning the manner in which Democritus put out his eyes— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Democritus Abderites, physicus philosophus,</q></l> +<l>Clypeum constituit contra exortum Hyperionis;</l> +<l>Oculos effodere ut posset splendore æreo.</l> +<l>Ita, radiis solis aciem effodit luminis,</l> +<l>Malis bene esse ne videret civibus.</l> +<l>Sic ego, fulgentis splendore pecuniæ,</l> +<l>Volo elucificare exitum ætatis meæ,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Ne in re bonâ esse videam nequam filium<note place="foot"> +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Democritus, the philosophic sage</q></l> +<l>Of Abdera, deep read in Nature’s page,</l> +<l>Opposed a brazen shield of polish bright</l> +<l>To full-orbed Phœbus’ mid-day shafts of light,</l> +<l>That the round mirror, having catched the rays,</l> +<l>Might blast his vision with the dazzling blaze;</l> +<l>Thus his extinguished eyes could ne’er behold</l> +<l>The wicked prosper. O that thus my gold</l> +<l>Might, with the lustre of its yellow light,</l> +<l>Dim through my closing years these orbs of sight,</l> +<l>Whose darkness would not see a thriftless son</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Waste the fair fortune which his fathers won!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +According to Aulus Gellius, Laberius has taken too much +license in inventing words; and that author also gives various +examples of his use of obsolete expressions, or such as were +employed only by the lowest dregs of the people<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. XVI. c. 7.</note>. Horace +seems to have considered an admiration of the Mimes of Laberius +as the consummation of critical folly<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satir.</hi> Lib. I. 10.</note>. I am far, however, +from considering Horace as an infallible judge of true +poetical excellence. He evidently attached more importance +to correctness and terseness of style, than to originality of +genius or fertility of invention. I am convinced he would +not have admired Shakspeare: He would have considered +Addison and Pope as much finer poets, and would have included +Falstaff, and Autolycus, and Sir Toby Belch, the +clowns and the boasters of our great dramatist, in the same +censure which he bestows on the <hi rend="italic">Plautinos sales</hi> and the Mimes +<pb n="332"/><anchor id="Pg332"/>of Laberius. Probably, too, the freedom of the prologue, and +other passages of his dramas, contributed to draw down the +disapprobation of this Augustan critic, as it already had placed +the dramatic wreath on the brow of +</p> + </div><div> + <index index="toc" level1="Publius Syrus"/><index index="pdf" level1="Publius Syrus"/> +<head>PUBLIUS SYRUS.</head> + +<p> +The celebrated Mime, called Publius Syrus, was brought +from Asia to Italy in early youth, in the same vessel with his +countryman and kinsman, Manlius Antiochus, the professor +of astrology, and Staberius Eros, the grammarian, who all, by +some desert in learning, rose above their original fortune. +He received a good education and liberty from his master, in +reward for his witticisms and facetious disposition. He first +represented his Mimes in the provincial towns of Italy, whence, +his fame having spread to Rome, he was summoned to the +capital, to assist in those public spectacles which Cæsar afforded +his countrymen, in exchange for their freedom<note place="foot">Macrobius, <hi rend="italic">Saturnal.</hi> Lib. II. c. 7.</note>. On one +occasion, he challenged all persons of his own profession to +contend with him on the stage; and in this competition he +successively overcame every one of his rivals. By his success +in the representation of these popular entertainments, he +amassed considerable wealth, and lived with such luxury, that +he never gave a great supper without having sow’s udder at +table—a dish which was prohibited by the censors, as being +too great a luxury even for the table of patricians<note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. VIII. c. 51.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Nothing farther is known of his history, except that he was +still continuing to perform his Mimes with applause at the period +of the death of Laberius. +</p> + +<p> +We have not the names of any of the Mimes of Publius; +nor do we precisely know their nature or subject,—all that is +preserved from them being a number of detached sentiments +or maxims, to the number of 800 or 900, seldom exceeding a +single line, but containing reflections of unrivalled force, truth, +and beauty, on all the various relations, situations, and feelings +of human life—friendship, love, fortune, pride, adversity, +avarice, generosity. Both the writers and actors of Mimes +were probably careful to have their memory stored with common-places +and precepts of morality, in order to introduce +them appropriately in their extemporaneous performances. +The maxims of Publius were interspersed through his dramas, +but being the only portion of these productions now remaining, +<pb n="333"/><anchor id="Pg333"/>they have just the appearance of thoughts or sentiments, like +those of Rochefoucauld. His Mimes must either have been +very numerous, or very thickly loaded with these moral aphorisms. +It is also surprising that they seem raised far above +the ordinary tone even of regular comedy, and appear for the +greater part to be almost stoical maxims. Seneca has remarked +that many of his eloquent verses are fitter for the +buskin than the slipper<note place="foot">Ep. viii.</note>. How such exalted precepts should +have been grafted on the lowest farce, and how passages, +which would hardly be <anchor id="corr333"/><corr sic="appropiate">appropriate</corr> in the most serious sentimental +comedy, were adapted to the actions or manners of +gross and drunken buffoons, is a difficulty which could only +be solved had we fortunately received entire a larger portion +of these productions, which seem to have been peculiar to +Roman genius. +</p> + +<p> +The sentiments of Publius Syrus now appear trite. They +have become familiar to mankind, and have been re-echoed +by poets and moralists from age to age. All of them are most +felicitously expressed, and few of them seem erroneous, while +at the same time they are perfectly free from the selfish or +worldly-minded wisdom of Rochefoucauld, or Lord Burleigh. +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Amicos res opimæ pavant, adversæ probant.</q></l> +<l>Miserrima fortuna est quæ inimico caret.</l> +<l>Ingratus unus miseris omnibus nocet.</l> +<l>Timidas vocat se cautum, parcum sordidus.</l> +<l>Etiam oblivisci quid scis interdum prodest.</l> +<l>In nullum avarus bonus, in se pessimus.</l> +<l>Cuivis dolori remedium est patientia.</l> +<l>Honestus rumor alterum est patrimonium.</l> +<l>Tam deest avaro quod habet quam quod non habet.</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">O vita misero longa—felici brevis!</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This last sentiment has been beautifully, but somewhat diffusely +expressed by Metastasio: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Perchè tarda è mai la morte</q></l> +<l>Quando è termine al martir?</l> +<l>A chi vive in lieta sorte</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">E sollecito il morir.</q>—<hi rend="italic">Artaserse</hi>.</l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +The same idea is thus expressed by La Bruyere: <q>La vie est +courte pour ceux qui sont dans les joyes du monde: Elle ne +paroit longue qu’a ceux qui languissent dans l’affliction. Job +se plaint de vivre long temps, et Salomon craint de mourir trop +jeune.</q> La Bruyere, indeed, has interspersed a vast number +of the maxims of the Roman Mime in his writings,—expanding, +modifying, or accommodating them to the manners of his age +<pb n="334"/><anchor id="Pg334"/>and country, as best suited his purpose. One of them only, +he quotes to reprehend: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> +<l><q>Ita amicum habeas, posse ut fieri inimicum putes.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +This sentiment, which Publius had borrowed from the Greeks, +and which is supposed to have been originally one of the sayings +of Bias, has been censured by Cicero, in his beautiful +treatise <hi rend="italic">De Amicitia</hi>, as the bane of friendship. It would be +endless to quote the lines of the different Latin poets, particularly +Horace and Juvenal, which are nearly copied from +the maxims of Publius Syrus. Seneca, too, has availed himself +of many of his reflections, and, at the same time, does full +justice to the author from whom he has borrowed. Publius, +says he, is superior in genius both to tragic and comic writers: +Whenever he gives up the follies of the Mimes, and that language +which is directed to the crowd, he writes many things +not only above that species of composition, but worthy of the +tragic buskin<note place="foot">Senec. <hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi></note>. +</p> + +<p> +Cneius Matius, also a celebrated writer of Mimes, was contemporary +with Laberius and Publius Syrus. Some writers +have confounded him with Caius Matius, who was a correspondent +of Cicero, and an intimate friend of Julius Cæsar. +Ziegler, though he distinguishes him from Cicero’s correspondent, +says, that he was the same person as the friend of Cæsar<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Mimis Romanorum</hi>, p. 66.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Aulus Gellius calls Matius a very learned man, (<hi rend="italic">homo +eruditus et impense doctus</hi>,) and frequently quotes him for +obsolete terms and forms of expression<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. XV. c. 25. Lib. X. c. 24.</note>. Like other writers +of Mimes, he indulged himself a good deal in this sort of phraseology, +but his diction was considered as agreeable and +highly poetical<note place="foot">Terent. Maurus, <hi rend="italic">De Metris</hi>; Ziegler, <hi rend="italic">De Mim. Rom.</hi> p. 66 and 67.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The Mimes of Matius were called Mimiambi, because chiefly +written in iambics; but not more than a dozen lines have descended +to us. The following verses have been praised for +elegance and a happy choice of expressions— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Quapropter edulcare convenit vitam,</q></l> +<l>Curasque acerbas sensibus gubernare;</l> +<l>Sinuque amicam recipere frigidam caldo</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Columbatimque labra conserens labris<note place="foot"> +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Tis fit that we the means employ,</q></l> +<l>To sweeten life, and life enjoy.</l> +<l>Let pleasure lay your cares to rest,</l> +<l>And clasp the fair one to your breast,</l> +<l>Give and receive the melting kiss,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Like doves in hours of amorous bliss.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg></note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="335"/><anchor id="Pg335"/> + +<p> +The age of Laberius, P. Syrus, and Matius, was the most +brilliant epoch in the history of the actors of Mimes. After +that period, they relapsed into a race of impudent buffoons; +and, in the reign of Augustus, were classed, by Horace, with +mountebanks and mendicants<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Satir.</hi> Lib. I. 2.</note>. Pantomimic actors, who did +not employ their voice, but represented everything by gesticulation +and dancing, became, under Augustus, the idols of the +multitude, the minions of the great, and the favourites of the +fair. The <hi rend="italic">Mimi</hi> were then but little patronized on the stage, +but were still admitted into convivial parties, and even the +court of the Emperors, to entertain the guests<note place="foot">Vopiscus. <hi rend="italic">Vit. Aurel.</hi> c. 42.</note>, like the Histrions, +Jongleurs, or privileged fools, of the middle ages; and +they were also employed at funerals, to mimic the manners of +the deceased. Thus, the Archimimus, who represented the +character of the avaricious Vespasian, at the splendid celebration +of his obsequies, inquired what would be the cost of all +this posthumous parade; and on being told that it would +amount to ten millions of sesterces, he replied, that if they +would give him a hundred thousand, they might throw his +body into the river<note place="foot">Suetonius, <hi rend="italic">In Vespas.</hi> c. 19.</note>. The audacity, however, of the Mimes +was carried still farther, as they satirized and insulted the +most ferocious Emperors during their lives, and in their own +presence. An actor, in one of these pieces which was performed +during the reign of Nero, while repeating the words +<q><hi rend="italic">Vale pater, vale mater</hi>,</q> signified by his gestures the two +modes of drowning and poisoning, in which that sanguinary +fiend had attempted to destroy both his parents<note place="foot">Id. <hi rend="italic">In Nerone</hi>, c. 29.</note>. The <hi rend="italic">Mimi</hi> +currently bestowed on Commodus the most opprobrious appellation<note place="foot">Appellatus est a Mimis quasi obstupratus.—Lampridius, <hi rend="italic">Vit. Commodi</hi>. c. 3.</note>. +One of their number, who performed before the enormous +Maximin, reminded the audience, that he who was too +strong for an individual, might be massacred by a multitude, +and that thus the elephant, lion, and tiger, are slain. The +tyrant perceived the sensation excited in the Theatre, but the +suggestion was veiled in a language unknown to that barbarous +and gigantic Thracian<note place="foot">Jul. Capitolinus, <hi rend="italic">In Maximin.</hi> c. 9.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The Mimes may be traced beyond the age of Constantine, +as we find the fathers of the church reprehending the immorality +and licentiousness of such exhibitions<note place="foot">Tertullian, <hi rend="italic">De Spectac.</hi> c. 17.—Lactantius. <hi rend="italic">Div. Inst.</hi> Lib. VI. c. 20.—Walker +on the <hi rend="italic">Italian Drama</hi>, p. 3.</note>. Tradition is +never so faithful as in the preservation of popular pastimes; +and accordingly, many of those which had amused the Romans +<pb n="336"/><anchor id="Pg336"/>survived their dominion. The annual celebration of Carnival +prolonged the remembrance of them during the dark ages. +Hence, the Mimes, and the Atellane fables formerly mentioned, +became the origin of the Italian pantomimic parts introduced in +the <hi rend="italic">Commedie dell’ arte</hi>, in which a subject was assigned, and the +scenes were enumerated; but in which the dialogue was left +to the extemporary invention of the actors, who represented +buffoon characters in masks, and spoke the dialect of different +districts. <q>As to Italy,</q> says Warburton, in an account +given by him of the Rise and Progress of the Modern Stage, +<q>the first rudiments of its theatre, with regard to the matter, +were profane subjects, and with regard to the form, a corruption +of ancient Mimes and Atellanes.</q>—Zanni is one of the +names of the Harlequin in the Italian comedies; and Sannio, as +we learn from ancient writers, was a ridiculous personage, +who performed in these Latin farces, with his head shaved<note place="foot">Rasis capitibus. Vossius, <hi rend="italic">Institut. Poetic.</hi> Lib. II. c. 32. § 4.</note>, +his face bedaubed with soot<note place="foot">Diomed. <hi rend="italic">De Orat.</hi> Lib. III.</note>, and clothed in party-coloured +garments—a dress universally worn by the ancient Italian +peasantry during the existence of the Roman Republic<note place="foot">Celsus, <hi rend="italic">De Re Rustica</hi>, Lib. I. c. 8.</note>. +The lowest species of mimic actors were called <hi rend="italic">planipedes</hi>, because +they performed without sock or buskin, and generally +barefooted, whence Harlequin’s flat unsho’d feet. A passage of +Cicero, in which he speaks of the Sannio, seems almost intended +to describe the perpetual and flexible motion of the limbs, +the ludicrous gestures, and mimetic countenance of Harlequin. +<q>Quid enim</q> says he, <q>potest tam ridiculum quam Sannio +esse? qui ore, vultu, imitandis motibus, voce, denique corpore +ridetur ipso<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, Lib. II. c. 61.</note>.</q> Among the Italians, indeed, this character +soon degenerated into a booby and glutton, who became +the butt of his more sharp-sighted companions. In France, +Harlequin was converted into a wit,—sometimes even a moralist; +and with us he has been transformed into an expert +magician, who astonishes by sudden changes of the scene: +But none of these was his original, or native character, which, +as we have seen, corresponded to the Sannio of the Mimes and +Atellane fables. In the year 1727, a bronze figure of high +antiquity, and of which Quadrio gives an engraving<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Storia D’Ogni Poesia</hi>, Tom. V. p. 220.</note>, was +found at Rome; and it appears from it, that the modern Pollicinella +of Naples is a lineal descendant of the <hi rend="italic">Mimus Albus</hi> +of the Atellanes<note place="foot">Riccoboni, <hi rend="italic">Hist. de Theatre Italien</hi>. Tom. I. p. 21.</note>. Ficoroni, who, in his work <hi rend="italic">Larve Sceniche</hi>, +compares his immense collection of Roman masks with the +<pb n="337"/><anchor id="Pg337"/>modern Italian characters, was possessed of an onyx, which represented +a Mime with a long nose and pointed cap, carrying +a bag of money in one hand, and two brass balls in the other, +which he sounded, as is supposed, like castanets when he danced. +These appendages correspond to the attributes which +distinguished the Italian dancer of Catana, known by the name +of Giangorgolo. Another onyx exhibits a figure resembling +that of Pantalone. It is also evident from the Antiques collected +by Ficoroni, that the Roman <hi rend="italic">Mimi</hi> were fond of representing +caricatures of foreign nations, as we find among these +ancient figures the attires of the oriental nations, and the garb +of old Gaul—a species of exhibition in which the <hi rend="italic">Commedia +dell’ arte</hi> also particularly delighted. +</p> + +<p> +These <hi rend="italic">Commedie dell’ arte</hi> were brought to the highest +pitch of comic and grotesque perfection by Ruzzante, an Italian +dramatist, who both wrote and performed a number of +them about the middle of the sixteenth century, and who, in +addition to Zany and Pollicinella, peopled the stage with a +new and enlivening crowd of mimetic characters. There appears +to be something so congenial to the Italian taste in +these exhibitions, that they long maintained their ground +against the regular dramas, produced by the numerous successors +of Trissino and Bibbiena, and kept supreme possession +of the Italian stage, till at length Goldoni, by introducing +beauties which were incongruous with the ancient masks, gradually +refined the taste of his audience, made them ashamed +of their former favourites, and then, in some of his pieces, +ventured to exclude from the stage the whole grotesque and +gesticulating family of Harlequin. +</p> + + <milestone unit="tb" rend="rule: 10%"/> +<p> +Having said so much (and, I fear, too much) of the Mimes, +and other departments of the Roman drama, it would not be +suitable to conclude without some notice, I. of the mechanical +construction of the theatre where the dramatic entertainments +were produced; and, II. of the actors’ declamation, as also of +the masks and other attributes of the characters which were +chiefly represented. +</p> + +<p> +I. Such was the severity of the ancient republican law, +that it permitted no places of amusement, except the circus, +where games were specially privileged from having been +instituted by Romulus, and exhibited in honour of the gods. +Satiric and dramatic representations, however, as we have +seen, gradually became popular; and, at length, so increased +<pb n="338"/><anchor id="Pg338"/>in number and importance, that a <hi rend="italic">Theatre</hi> was required for +their performance. +</p> + +<p> +The subject of the construction of the Roman theatre is +attended with difficulty and confusion. While there are still +considerable remains of amphitheatres, scarcely any ruins or +vestiges of theatres exist. The writings of the ancients throw +little light on the topic; and there is much contradiction, or +at least apparent inconsistency, in what has been written, in +consequence of the alterations which took place in the construction +of theatres in the progress of time. +</p> + +<p> +Those stages, which were erected in the earliest periods of +the Roman republic, for the exhibitions of dancers and histrions, +were probably set up according to the Etruscan mode, +in places covered with boughs of trees, (Nemorosa palatia,) +in tents or booths, or, at best, in temporary and moveable +buildings—perhaps not much superior in dignity or accommodation +to the cart of Thespis. +</p> + +<p> +But, though the Etruscan histrions probably constructed +the stage on which they were to perform, according to the +fashion of their own country, the Greek was the model of the +regular Roman theatre, as much as the pieces of Euripides +and Menander were the prototypes of the Latin tragedies and +comedies. The remains of a playhouse believed to be Etruscan, +were discovered at Adria about the middle of the seventeenth +century. But there was a wider difference between it +and the Roman theatre, than between the Roman and the +Greek. The Greeks had a large orchestra, and a very limited +stage—the Romans, a confined orchestra, and extensive stage; +while in the Adrian theatre, the orchestra was larger even +than in the Greek<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Dissert. dell Academ. Etrusc.</hi> Tom. III.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The first regular theatre at Rome was that constructed for +Livius Andronicus on the Aventine Hill. This building, however, +was but temporary, and probably existed no longer than +the distinguished dramatist and actor for whose accommodation +it was erected. In the year 575, M. Æmilius Lepidus got +a theatre constructed adjacent to the temple of Apollo<note place="foot">Livy, Lib. XL. c. 51. Theatrum et proscenium ad Apollinis ædem Jovis in +Capitolio, columnasque circa poliendas albo locavit.</note>; but +it also was one of those occasional buildings, which were +removed after the series of dramatic exhibitions for which +they had been intended were concluded. A short while before +the commencement of the third Punic war, a playhouse, which +the censors were fitting up with seats for the convenience of +the spectators, was thrown down by a decree of the senate, +<pb n="339"/><anchor id="Pg339"/>as prejudicial to public morals; and the people continued for +some time longer to view the representations standing, as +formerly<note place="foot">Livy, <hi rend="italic">Epitom.</hi> Lib. XLVIII. Quum locatum a censoribus theatrum exstrueretur; +P. C. Nasica auctore, tanquam inutile, et nociturum publicis moribus, ex senatusconsulto +destructum est: populusque aliquandiu stans ludos spectavit.</note>. At length, M. Æmilius Scaurus built a theatre +capable of containing 80,000 spectators, and provided with +every possible accommodation for the public. It was also +adorned with amazing magnificence, and at almost incredible +expense. Its stage had three lofts or stories, rising above each +other, and supported by 360 marble columns. The lowest +floor was of marble—the second was incrusted with glass; +and the third was formed of gilded boards or planks. The +pillars were thirty-eight feet in height: and between them +were placed bronze statues and images, to the number of not +fewer than 3000. There was besides an immense superfluity +of rich hangings of cloth of gold; and painted tablets, the +most exquisite that could be procured, were disposed all +around the <hi rend="italic">pulpitum</hi> and scenes<note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XXXVI. c. 15.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Curio, being unable to rival such profuse and costly decoration, +distinguished himself by a new invention, which he +introduced at the funeral entertainments given by him in honour +of his father’s memory. He constructed two large edifices of +wood adjacent to each other, and suspended on hinges so +contrived that the buildings could be united at their centre or +separated, in such a manner as to form a theatre or amphitheatre, +according to the nature of the exhibition. In both +these fabrics he made stage plays be acted in the early part +of the day—the semicircles being placed back to back, so +that the declamation, music, and applauses, in the one, did +not reach the other; and then, having wheeled them round in +the afternoon, so that, by completing the circle, they formed +an amphitheatre, he exhibited combats of gladiators<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ibid.</hi></note>. All +these changes were performed without displacing the spectators, +who seem to have fearlessly trusted themselves to the +strength of the machinery, and skill of the artist. +</p> + +<p> +The theatres of Scaurus and Curio, though they far surpassed +in extent and sumptuous decoration all the permanent +theatres of modern times: yet, being built of wood, and being +only destined for a certain number of representations during +certain games or festivals, were demolished when these were +concluded. The whole furnishings and costly materials of +the theatre of Scaurus were immediately removed to his private +villa, where they were burned, it is said, by his servants, +<pb n="340"/><anchor id="Pg340"/>in a transport of indignation at the extravagant profusion of +their master<note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XXXVI. c. 15.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Pompey was the first person who erected a permanent +theatre of stone. After the termination of the Mithridatic +war, he made a coasting voyage along the shores and islands +of Greece. In the whole of his progress he showed the attention +of a liberal and cultivated mind to monuments of art. +The theatre of Mitylene particularly pleased him, both in its +outward form, and interior construction. He carried away +with him a model of this building, that he might erect at +Rome a theatre similar to it<note place="foot">Plutarch, <hi rend="italic">In Pompeio</hi>.</note>, but on a larger scale. The +edifice which he built on the plan of this theatre, after his +return to Rome, was situated in the field of Flora, near the +temple of Venus Victrix, and held just one half of the number +of spectators which the playhouse of Scaurus contained<note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XXXVI. c. 15.</note>. It +was completed during Pompey’s second consulship, in the +year 698. On the day on which it was opened, Æsopus, the +great tragic actor, appeared for the last time in one of his +favourite characters, but his strength and voice failed him, +and he was unable to finish the part. +</p> + +<p> +The construction of this theatre was speedily followed by +the erection of others. But all the Roman theatres which +were built towards the close of the republic, and commencement +of the empire, were formed, in most respects, on the +model of the Greek theatre, both in their external plan and +interior arrangement. They were oblong semicircular buildings, +forming the half of an amphitheatre; and were thus +rounded at one end, and terminated on the other by a long +straight line. The interior was divided into three parts—1. +The place for the spectators; 2. The orchestra; and, 3. The +stage<note place="foot">Vitruvius, Lib. V. c. 6.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +1. The universal passion of the Roman people for all sorts +of exhibitions, rendered the places from which they were to +view them a matter of competition and importance. Originally +there were no seats in the theatres, and the senators +stood promiscuously with the people; yet, such in those days +was the reverence felt by the plebeians for their dignified +superiors, that, notwithstanding their rage for spectacles, +they never pushed before a senator<note place="foot">Alexander ab Alexandro, <hi rend="italic">Dies Geniales</hi>, Lib. V. c. 16.</note>. It was in the year 559, +during the consulship of the elder Scipio Africanus with +Sempronius Longus, that the former carried a law, by which +separate places were assigned to the senators<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ibid.</hi></note>. +This regu<pb n="341"/><anchor id="Pg341"/>lation was renewed from time to time, as circumstances of +political confusion removed the line of distinction which had +been drawn. Scipio lost much of his popularity by this aristocratic +innovation, and is said to have severely repented of +the share he had taken in it<note place="foot">Alexander ab Alexandro, <hi rend="italic">Dies Geniales</hi>, Lib. V. c. 16.</note>. By the law of Scipio, part of +the orchestra, (which, in the Greek theatre, was occupied by +the chorus,) was appropriated to the senators. The knights +and plebeians, however, continued to sit promiscuously for +more than 100 years longer; but at length, in 685, a regulation +of the tribune, Roscius Otho, allotted to the knights, tribunes, +and persons of a certain <hi rend="italic">census</hi>, fourteen rows of circular +benches immediately behind the orchestra. This was a still more +unpopular measure than that introduced by the edict of Africanus. +Otho, during the consulship of Cicero, having entered +the theatre, was hissed by the multitude, while Roscius was +acting one of his principal parts; but Cicero presently called +them out to the temple of Bellona, where he delivered a +harangue, which appeased their fury and reconciled them to +the tribune<note place="foot">Schütz, <hi rend="italic">ad Fragment. Oper. Ciceronis</hi>, Tom. XVI.</note>. Henceforth the senators held undisputed possession +of the orchestra; and the knights, with the better +classes, retained the fourteen rows of seats immediately surrounding +it. +</p> + +<p> +The seats for the senators, arranged in the orchestra, were +straight benches, placed at equal distances from each other, +and were not fixed<note place="foot">Wilkins’ <hi rend="italic">Vitruvius</hi>, Vol. II. p. 185.</note>. The other benches, which were assigned +to the knights and people, were semicircularly disposed +around the circumference of the theatre, and spread from the +orchestra to the rounded end of the building The extremities +of the seats joined the orchestra, and they were carried +one above another, sloping, till they reached the remotest +part, and ascended almost to the ceiling. Thus the benches +which were lowest and most contiguous to the orchestra, +described a smaller circumference than those which spread +more towards the outer walls of the theatre<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ibid.</hi> Lib. V. c. 8.</note>. Over the +higher tier of seats a portico was constructed, the roof of +which ranged with the loftiest part of the scene, in order that +the voice expanding equally, might be carried to the uppermost +seats, and thence to the top of the building<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Ibid.</hi> Lib. V. c. 7.</note>. The +benches, which were gently raised above each other, were +separated into three sets or tiers: each tier, at least in most +theatres, consisting of seven benches. According to some +<pb n="342"/><anchor id="Pg342"/>writers, the separation of these tiers was a passage, or gallery, +which went quite round them for facility of communication; +according to others, it was a belt, or precinction, which was +twice the height, and twice the breadth of the seats<note place="foot">Montfaucon, <hi rend="italic">L’Antiquité Devoilé</hi>, Liv. II. c. 1.</note>. It +would appear, however, from a passage in Vitruvius, that +both a raised belt, and a gallery or corridore, surrounded +each tier of seats<note place="foot">Lib. V. c. 3.</note>. One of the precinctions formed the +division between the places of the knights and those of the +people<note place="foot">Montfaucon, Liv. II. c. 3.</note>. In a different and angular direction, the tiers and +ranges of seats were separated by stairs, making so many +lines in the circumference of the seats, and leading from +the orchestra to the doors of the theatre. The benches +were cut by the stairs into the form of wedges. The steps of +the stairs were always a little lower than the seats; but the +number of stairs varied in different theatres. Pompey’s +theatre had fifteen, that of Marcellus only seven<note place="foot">Montfaucon, Liv. II. c. 1.</note>. As luxury +increased at Rome, these stairs were bedewed with streams of +fragrant water, for the purposes of coolness and refreshment. +At the top of each flight of steps were doors called <hi rend="italic">vomitoria</hi>, +which gave egress from the theatre, and communicated +directly with the external stair-cases<note place="foot">Ibid. and Macrobius, <hi rend="italic">Saturnalia</hi>, Lib. VI. c. 4.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +In the ancient temporary Roman theatres, the body of the +building, or place where the spectators sat, was open at top +to receive the light. But Quintus Catulus, during the entertainments +exhibited at his dedication of the Capitol, introduced +the luxury of canvass, which was drawn partially or +completely over the theatre at pleasure<note place="foot">Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XIX. c. 1.</note>. This curtain was +at first of simple unornamented <anchor id="corr342"/><corr sic="woof">wool</corr>, and was merely used as +a screen from the sun, or a protection from rain; but, in +process of time, silken hangings of glossy texture and splendid +hues waved from the roof, flinging their gorgeous tints on the +<hi rend="italic">proscenium</hi> and spectators:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Et vulgo faciunt id lutea russaque vela,</q></l> +<l>Et ferrugina, quum, magnis intenta theatris,</l> +<l>Per malos vulgata trabesque, trementia fluctant.</l> +<l>Namque ibi consessum caveai subter, et omnem</l> +<l>Scenalem speciem, patrum, matrumque, deorumque,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Inficiunt, coguntque suo fluitare colore<note place="foot">Lucretius, Lib. IV.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +2. <hi rend="italic">The Orchestra</hi> was a considerable space in the centre +of the theatre, part of which was allotted for the seats of the +<pb n="343"/><anchor id="Pg343"/>senators. The remainder was occupied by those who played +upon musical instruments, whose office it was, in the performance +both of tragedies and comedies, to give to the +actors and audience the tone of feeling which the dramatic +parts demanded. In tragedies, the music invariably accompanied +the Chorus. It was not, however, confined to the +Chorus; but appears to have been also in the monologues, +and perhaps in some of the most impassioned parts of the dialogue; +for Cicero tells of Roscius, that he said, when he grew +older, he would make the music play slower, that he might +the more easily keep up with it<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, Lib. I. c. 60.</note>. I do not, however, believe, +that comedy was a musical performance throughout: Mr Hawkins, +after quoting a number of authorities to this purpose, +concludes, <q>that comedy had no music but between the acts, +except, perhaps, occasionally in the case of marriages and +sacrifices, if any such were represented on the stage<note place="foot">Hawkins’ <hi rend="italic">Inquiry into Greek and Latin Poetry</hi>, § xiii.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +Every play had its own musical prelude, which distinguished +it from others, and from which many of the audience at once +knew what piece was about to be performed<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Academica</hi>, Lib. II. c. 7.—<q>Primo inflatu tibicinis, Antiopam esse +aiunt, aut Andromacham.</q></note>. The chief +musical instruments employed in the theatre were the <hi rend="italic">tibiæ</hi>, +or flutes, with which the comedies of Terence are believed to +have been represented. The <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> is said to have been +acted, <q>Tibiis paribus, dextris et sinistris;</q>—the <hi rend="italic">Eunuch</hi>, <q>Tibiis +duabus dextris;</q>—the <hi rend="italic">Heautontimorumenos</hi>, on its first +appearance, <q>Tibiis imparibus;</q> on its second, <q>Duabus dextris;</q>—the +<hi rend="italic">Adelphi</hi>, <q>Tibiis sarranis;</q>—the <hi rend="italic">Hecyra</hi>, <q>Tibiis +paribus,</q>—and the <hi rend="italic">Phormio</hi>, <q>Tibiis imparibus.</q> It thus +appears, that the theatrical flutes were classed as <q>dextræ et +sinistræ,</q> and also as <q>pares et impares,</q> and that there were +likewise <q>Tibiæ Serranæ,</q> or <q>Sarranæ,</q> to which, it is believed, +the Phrygiæ were opposed. There has been much +dispute, however, as to what constituted the distinction between +these different sets of pipes. Scaliger thinks, that the +<q>Tibiæ dextræ et sinistræ</q> were formed by cutting the reed +into two parts: that portion which was next to the root making +the left, and that next to the top the right flute.—whence +the notes of the former were more grave, and those of the +latter more acute<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Poet.</hi> Lib. I. c. 20.—See also Theophrastus ap. Bartholinus, <hi rend="italic">De Tibiis Veterum</hi>, +Lib. I. c. 4, and Plin. <hi rend="italic">Hist. Nat.</hi> Lib. XVI. c. 36.</note>. Mad. Dacier, however, is of opinion, that +flutes were denominated right and left from the valves, in +playing, being stopped with the right or left hand. There is +<pb n="344"/><anchor id="Pg344"/>still more difficulty with regard to the <q>Tibiæ pares et impares.</q> +Some persons conjecture, that the Tibiæ pares were +a set of two or more pipes of the same pitch in the musical +scale, and Impares such as did not agree in pitch<note place="foot">Hawkins’ <hi rend="italic">Inquiry into Lat. Poet.</hi> p. 184.</note>. The +opinion, that flutes were called Pares when they had an even, +and Impares when an odd number of valves, is not inconsistent +with this notion; nor with that adopted by Dempster<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Antiquitates Romanæ</hi>.</note>, that +the difference depended on their being equal or unequal distances +between the valves. It may be also reconciled with +the idea of Salmasius, that when the same set of flutes were +employed, as two right or two left, a play was said to be acted +Tibiis paribus; and, when one or more right with one or more +left were used, it was announced as performed Tibiis imparibus. +This idea, however, of Salmasius, is inconsistent with +what is said as to the <hi rend="italic">Andria</hi> being acted with equal flutes +right and left; unless, indeed, we suppose, with Mad. Dacier, +that this is to be understood of different representations, and +that the flutes were of the same description at each performance, +but were sometimes a set of right, and at other times a +set of left flutes. +</p> + +<p> +As to the Tibiæ Serranæ, some have supposed that they +were so called from Serra, since they produced the sharp grating +sound occasioned by a saw<note place="foot">Turnebus, <hi rend="italic">Advers.</hi> Lib. XXVIII. c. 34.</note>; some, that they were denominated +Sarranæ from Sarra, a city in Phœnicia, where +such flutes are believed to have been invented<note place="foot">Servius ap. Bartholin. <hi rend="italic">De Tibiis Veter.</hi></note>; and others, +that they derived their name from Sero to lock; because in +these flutes, there were valves or stops which opened and shut +alternately<note place="foot">Hawkins’ <hi rend="italic">Inquiry</hi>, p. 187.</note>. It is only farther known, that the Tibiæ Serranæ +belonged to the class called Pares, and the Phrygiæ, to +which they were opposed, to that styled Impares. +</p> + +<p> +All flutes, of whatever denomination, were <anchor id="corr344"/><corr sic="entremely">extremely</corr> simple +in the commencement of the dramatic art at Rome. Their +form was plain, and they had but few notes. In progress of +time, however, they became more complex, and louder in +their tones<note place="foot">Horat. <hi rend="italic">Art. Poet.</hi> v. 202.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Several chorded instruments were also used in the orchestra, +as the lyre and harp, and in later times an hydraulic organ +was introduced. This instrument, which is described in the +<hi rend="italic">Organon</hi> of Pub. Optatianus, emitted a sound which was produced +from air created by the concussion of water. Cornelius +Severus, in his poem of <hi rend="italic">Ætna</hi>, alludes to it, under the +name of <hi rend="italic">Cortina</hi>— +</p> + +<pb n="345"/><anchor id="Pg345"/> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Carmineque irriguo magni Cortina Theatri</q></l> +<l>Imparibus numerosa modis canit arte regentis,</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Quæ tenuem impellens animam subremigat undam<note place="foot">v. 295. On the subject of the Hydraulicon, see Wernsdorff, <hi rend="italic">Poet. Lat. Min.</hi> +Tom. II. p. 394; and Busby’s <hi rend="italic">History of Music</hi>.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +3. <hi rend="italic">The Stage</hi>. The front area of the stage was a little elevated +above that part of the orchestra where the musicians +were placed, and was called the <hi rend="italic">Proscenium</hi>. On the proscenium +a wooden platform, termed the <hi rend="italic">pulpitum</hi>, was raised to +the height of five feet<note place="foot">Vitruvius, Lib. V. c. 6. Montfaucon, Liv. II. c. 1.</note>. This the actors ascended to perform +their characters; and here all the dramatic representations of +the Romans were exhibited<note place="foot">Ibid.</note>, except the Mimes, which were +acted on the lower floor of the proscenium. Certain architectural +proportions were assigned to all these different parts of +the theatre. +</p> + +<p> +The whole space or area behind the pulpitum was called +the <hi rend="italic">Scena</hi>, because the scenery appropriate to the piece was +there exhibited. <q>The three varieties of scenes,</q> says Vitruvius, +<q>are termed tragic, comic, and satyric, each of which +has a style of decoration peculiar to itself. In the tragic +scene columns are represented, with statues, and other embellishments +suitable to palaces and public buildings. The +comic scene represents the houses of individuals, with their +balconies and windows arranged in imitation of private dwellings. +The satyric is adorned with groves, dens, and mountains, +and other rural objects.</q> The rigid adherence of the +ancients to the unity of place, rendered unnecessary that frequent +shifting of scenes which is required in our dramas. +When the side scenes were changed, the frames, or painted +planks, were turned by machinery, and the scene was then +called <hi rend="italic">versatilis</hi>, or revolving: When it was withdrawn altogether, +and another brought forward, it was called <hi rend="italic">ductilis</hi>, or, +sliding. There were also trapdoors in the floor of this part of +the theatre, by which ghosts and the Furies ascended when +their presence was required; and machines were disposed +above the scene, as also at its sides, by which gods and other +superior beings were suddenly brought upon the stage. +</p> + +<p> +At the bottom of the scene, or end most remote from the +spectators, there was a curtain of painted canvass, which +was first used after the tapestry of Attalus had been brought +to Rome<note place="foot">Stephens, <hi rend="italic">De Theatris</hi>.</note>. It was dropped when the play began, remained +down during the performance, and was drawn up when the +<pb n="346"/><anchor id="Pg346"/>representation concluded. This was certainly the case during +the existence of the republic; but I imagine that an alteration +took place in the time of the emperors, and that the +curtain, being brought more forward on the scene, was then, +as with us, raised at the commencement, and dropped at the +end of the piece:— +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Mox ubi ridendas inclusit pagina partes,</q></l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Vera redit facies, dissimulata perit<note place="foot">Pet. Arbiter, <hi rend="italic">Satyric.</hi> c. 80.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<p> +At each side of the <hi rend="italic">scena</hi> there were doors called <hi rend="italic">Hospitalia</hi>, +by which the actors entered and made their exits. +</p> + +<p> +That part of the theatre which comprehended the stage and +scene was originally covered with branches of trees, which +served both for shelter and ornament. It was afterwards shut +in with planks, which were painted for the first time in the +year 654. About the same period the scene was enriched +with gold and silver hangings, and the proscenium was decorated +with columns, statues, and altars to the god in whose +honour, or at whose festival, the stage plays were represented. +</p> + + <milestone unit="tb"/> + +<p> +II. In turning our attention to the <hi rend="italic">actors</hi> who appeared on +the <hi rend="italic">pulpitum</hi> of the Roman stage, the point which first attracts +our notice is that supposed separation of the dramatic labour, +by which one performer gesticulated while the other declaimed. +This division, however, did not take place at all in comedy, +or in the ordinary dialogue (<hi rend="italic">Diverbia</hi>) of tragedy; as is +evinced by various passages in the Latin authors, which show +that Æsopus, the chief tragic actor, and Roscius, the celebrated +comedian, both gesticulated and declaimed. Cicero informs +us, that Æsopus was hissed if he was in the least degree +hoarse<note place="foot">Æsopum, si paullum irrauserit, explodi. <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, Lib. I. c. 60.</note>; and he also mentions one remarkable occasion, on +which, having returned to the stage after he had long retired +from it, his voice suddenly failed him just as he commenced +an adjuration in the part he represented<note place="foot">Noster Æsopus, jurare quum cœpisset, vox eum defecit in illo loco <q>Si sciens +fallo.</q> <hi rend="italic">Epist. Famil.</hi> Lib. VII. ep. 1. Ed. Schütz.</note>. This evinces +that Æsopus declaimed; and the same author affords us proof +that he gesticulated: For, in the treatise <hi rend="italic">De Divinatione</hi>, he +introduces his brother Quintus, declaring, that he had himself +witnessed in Æsopus such animation of countenance, and +vehemence of gesture, that he seemed carried beside himself +<pb n="347"/><anchor id="Pg347"/>by some irresistible power<note place="foot">Vidi in Æsopo familiari tuo, tantum ardorem vultuum atque motuum, ut eum +vis quædam abstraxisse a sensu mentis videretur. c. 37</note>. Roscius, indeed, is chiefly talked +of for the gracefulness of his gestures<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">pro Archia</hi>, c. 8. Valer. Maxim. Lib. VIII. c. 7</note>, but there are also passages +which refer to the modulation of his voice<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">De Legibus</hi>, Lib. I. c. 4.</note>. It may +perhaps, however, be said, that the above citations only prove +that the same actor gesticulated in some characters, and declaimed +in others; it seems, however, much more probable +that Æsopus went through the whole dramatic part, than that +he appeared in some plays merely as a gesticulating, and in +others as a declaiming, performer. +</p> + +<p> +There was thus no division in the ordinary dialogue, or <hi rend="italic">diverbium</hi>, +as it was called, and it was employed only in the +monologues, and those parts of high excitement and pathos, +which were declaimed somewhat in the tone of <hi rend="italic">recitativo</hi> in +an Italian opera, and were called <hi rend="italic">Cantica</hi>, from being accompanied +either by the flutes or by instrumental music. That +one actor should have recited, and another performed the corresponding +gestures in the scenes of a tragedy, and that, too, in +parts of the highest excitement, and in which theatric illusion +should have been rendered most complete, certainly appears the +most incongruous and inexplicable circumstance in the history +of the Roman Drama. This division did not exist on the +Greek stage, but it commenced at Rome as early as the time +of Livius Andronicus, who, being <hi rend="italic">encored</hi>, as we call it, in his +monologues, introduced a slave, who declaimed to the sound +of the flute, while he himself executed the corresponding +gesticulations<note place="foot">Livy, Lib. VII. c. 2.</note>. To us nothing can seem at first view more +ridiculous, and more injurious to theatric illusion, than one +person going through a dumb show or pantomime, while another, +who must have appeared a supernumerary on the pulpitum, +recited, with his arms across, the corresponding verses, +in tones of the utmost vehemence and pathos<note place="foot">I at one time was inclined to think that the reciting actor was concealed behind +the pulpitum, which was elevated on the stage about the height of a man, and +hence that the spectators saw only the gesticulating actor. If this plan was actually +adopted, the representation may have been conducted without any apparent incongruity +or violation of the scenic illusion. In Lord Gardenstoun’s <q><hi rend="italic">Travelling +Memorandums</hi>,</q> we have an account of a play which he saw acted at Paris, where, +in order to elude a privilege, the actors who appeared on the stage did not speak +one word. <q>Their lips,</q> continued his lordship, <q>move, and they go on with +corresponding action and attitudes. But every word of the play is uttered with +surprising propriety and character by persons behind the scenes. The play was +nearly over before this singularity was discovered to me and others of our party. +The whole was so strangely managed, that we could have sworn the visible actors +were also the speakers.</q> (Vol. I. p. 24.) I have not, however, been able to discover +any ancient authority, from which it can be inferred that the representation of +a Roman play was conducted in this manner by the reciting actor being placed +either behind the scenes or pulpitum; and all authorities concur as to this strange +division of dramatic labour, at least in the monologues of tragedies.</note>. It must, +<pb n="348"/><anchor id="Pg348"/>however, be recollected, that the Roman theatres were larger +and worse lighted than ours; that the mask prevented even the +nearest spectators from perceiving the least motion of the lips, +and they thus heard only the words without knowing whether +they proceeded from him who recited or gestured; and, finally, +that these actors were so well trained, that they agreed precisely +in their respective parts. We are informed by Cicero, +that a comedian who made a movement out of time was as +much hissed as one who mistook the pronunciation of a word +or quantity of a syllable in a verse<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">Paradox.</hi> III. c. 2.</note>. Seneca says, that it is +surprising to see the attitudes of eminent comedians on the +stage overtake and keep pace with speech, notwithstanding +the velocity of the tongue<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Epist.</hi> 121.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +So much importance was attached to the art of dramatic +gesticulation, that it was taught in the schools; and there were +instituted motions as well as natural. These artificial gestures, +however, of arbitrary signification, were chiefly employed in +pantomime, where speech not being admitted, more action +was required to make the piece intelligible: And it appears +from Quintilian, that comedians who acted with due decorum, +never, or but very rarely, made use of instituted signs in their +gesticulation<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Inst. Orat.</hi> Lib. XI. c. 3.</note>. The movements suited to theatrical declamation +were subdivided into three different sorts. The first, +called <hi rend="italic">Emmelia</hi>, was adapted to tragic declamation; the +second, <hi rend="italic">Cordax</hi>, was fitted to comedies; and the third, <hi rend="italic">Sicinnis</hi>, +was proper to satiric pieces, as the Mimes and <hi rend="italic">Exodia</hi><note place="foot">Athenæus, Lib. I. Dubos, <hi rend="italic">Reflexions sur la Poésie</hi>, Lib. III. c. 14.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +The recitation was also accounted of high importance, so +that the player who articulated took prodigious pains to improve +his voice, and an almost whimsical care to preserve it<note place="foot">Cicero, <hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, Lib. I.</note>. +Nearly a third part of Dubos’ once celebrated work on Poetry +and Painting, is occupied with the theatric declamation of +the Roman actors. The art of framing the declamation of +dramatic pieces was, he informs us, the object of a particular +study, and indeed profession, at Rome. It was composed and +signified in notes, placed over each verse of the play, to direct +the tones and inflection of voice which were to be observed +in recitation. There were a certain number of accents in the +<pb n="349"/><anchor id="Pg349"/>Latin language, and the composer of a declamation marked +each syllable requiring to be accented, the grave or the acute +accent which properly belonged to it, while on the remaining +syllables, he noted, by means of conventional marks, a tone +conformable to the tenor of the discourse. The declamation +was thus not a musical song, but a recitation subject to the +direction of a noted melody. Tragic declamation was graver +and more harmonious than comic, but even the comic was more +musical and varied than the pronunciation used in ordinary +conversation<note place="foot">Quintil. <hi rend="italic">Instit. Orat.</hi> Lib. II. c. 10.</note>. This system, it might be supposed, would +have deprived the actors of much natural fire and enthusiasm, +from the constraint to which they were thus subjected; but +the whole dramatic system of the ancients was more artificial +than ours, and something determinate and previously arranged, +as to quantities and pauses, was perhaps essential to enable +the gesticulating actor to move in proper concert with the +reciter. The whole system, however, of noted declamation, +is denied by Duclos and Racine, who think it impossible that +accentuated tones of passion could be devised or employed<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Mem. de l’Acad. des Inscriptions</hi>, T. 21.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Both the actor who declaimed, and he who gesticulated, +wore <hi rend="italic">masks</hi>; and, before concluding the subject of the Roman +theatre, it may not be improper to say a few words concerning +this singular dramatic contrivance, as also concerning the +attire of the performers. +</p> + +<p> +From the opportunity which they so readily afforded, of +personally satirizing individuals, by representing a caricatured +resemblance of their features, masks were first used in the old +Greek comedy, which assumed the liberty of characterizing +living citizens of Athens. It is most probable, however, that +the hint of dramatic masks was given to the Romans by the +Etruscans<note place="foot">Bonarota, <hi rend="italic">Addit. ad Dempster. Etruria Regalis</hi>, § 36.</note>. That they were employed by the histrions of +that latter nation, can admit of no doubt. The actors represented +on the Etruscan vases are all masked, and have caps +on their heads<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Dissert. dell’ Acad. Etrusc.</hi> T. III.</note>. We also know, that in some of the satirical +exhibitions of the ancient Italians, they wore masks made of +wood: +</p> + +<lg> +<!-- poem --> + <l><q rend="post: none">Nec non Ausonii, Trojâ gens missa, coloni</q></l> +<l>Versibus incomptis ludunt, risuque soluto</l> +<l><q rend="pre: none">Oraque corticibus sumunt horrenda cavatis<note place="foot">Virgil. <hi rend="italic">Georg.</hi> Lib. II.</note>.</q></l> +<!-- poem --> +</lg> + +<pb n="350"/><anchor id="Pg350"/> + +<p> +Originally, and in the time of L. Andronicus, the actors on +the Roman stage used only caps or beavers<note place="foot">Berger, <hi rend="italic">Comment. de Personis</hi>, Lib. II. sect. 9.</note>, and their faces +were daubed and disguised with the lees of wine, as at the +commencement of the dramatic art in Greece. The increased +size, however, of the theatres, and consequent distance of the +spectators from the stage, at length compelled the Roman +players to borrow from art the expression of those passions +which could no longer be distinguished on the living countenance +of the actor. +</p> + +<p> +Most of the Roman masks covered not merely the face, but +the greater part of the head<note place="foot">Au. Gellius, <hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. V. c. 7.</note>, so that the beard and hair were +delineated, as well as the features. This indeed is implied in +one of the fables of Phædrus, where a fox, after having +examined a tragic mask, which he found lying in his way, +exclaims, <q>What a vast shape without brains<note place="foot">Lib. I. Fab. 7. <q>O quanta species, inquit,</q> &c.</note>!</q>—An observation +obviously absurd, if applied to a mere vizard for the face, +which was not made, and could not have been expected, to +contain any brains. Addison, in his <hi rend="italic">Travels in Italy</hi>, mentions, +that, in that country, he had seen statues of actors, with +the <hi rend="italic">larva</hi> or mask. One of these was not merely a vizard for +the face; it had false hair, and came over the whole head like +an helmet. He also mentions, however, that he has seen +figures of Thalia, sometimes with an entire head-piece in her +hand, and a friz running round the edges of the face; but at +others, with a mask merely for the countenance, like the +modern vizards of a masquerade. +</p> + +<p> +The masks of the regular theatre were made of chalk, or +pipe-clay, or terra cotta. A few were of metal, but these +were chiefly the masks of the Mimes. The chalk or clay +masks were so transparent and artfully prepared, that the play +of the muscles could be seen through them; and it appears +that an opening was frequently left for the eyes, since Cicero +informs us expressly, that in parts of high pathos or indignation, +the actor’s eyes were often observed to sparkle under the +vizard<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, Lib. II. c. 47.</note>. From a vast collection of Roman masks engraved in +the work of Ficoroni, <hi rend="italic">De Larvis Scenicis</hi>, it appears that most +of them represented features considerably distorted, and +enlarged beyond the natural proportions. A wide and gaping +mouth is one of their chief characteristics. The mask being +in a great measure contrived to prevent the dispersion of the +<pb n="351"/><anchor id="Pg351"/>voice, the mouth was so formed, and was so incrusted with +metal, as to have somewhat the effect of a speaking-trumpet—hence +the Romans gave the name of <hi rend="italic">persona</hi> to masks, because +they rendered the articulation of those who wore them more +distinct and sonorous<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Noct. Attic.</hi> Lib. V. c. 7.</note>. There are, however, a few figures in +the work of Ficoroni, carrying in their hands masks which are +not unnaturally distorted, and which have, in several instances, +a resemblance to the actor who holds them. M. Boindin, on +the authority of a passage in Lucian’s <hi rend="italic">Dialogue on Dancing</hi>, +thinks that these less hideous masks were employed by dancers, +or pantomimic actors, who, as they did not speak, had no +occasion for the distended mouth<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Mem. de l’Academ. des Inscriptions</hi>, &c. Tom. IV.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +Roscius, who had some defect in his eyes, is said to have +been the first actor who used the Greek mask<note place="foot">Athenæus, Lib. XIV. Pitiscus, Lexicon, voce <hi rend="italic">Persona</hi>. Berger, <hi rend="italic">Comment. +De Personis</hi>, c. II. § 9.</note>: but it was not +invariably worn even by him, as appears from a passage of +Cicero.—<q>All,</q> says that author, <q>depends upon the face, and +all the power of the face is centred in the eyes. Of this our +old men are the best judges, for they were not lavish of their +applause even to Roscius in a mask<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">De Oratore</hi>, Lib. III. c. 59. <q>Nostri illi senes personatum ne Roscium quidem +magnopere laudabant.</q> This passage, however, is of somewhat doubtful interpretation. +It may mean that these old men, having been accustomed to the natural +countenance, did not applaud even so great an actor as Roscius, because he was +invariably masked: or it may signify, that they did not greatly admire him when +masked, and only applauded him when he appeared in his natural aspect. As some +authorities say that Roscius <hi rend="italic">invariably</hi> used the mask, the former interpretation +may, perhaps, appear the most probable.</note>.</q> +</p> + +<p> +The different characters who chiefly appeared on the Roman +stage—the father, the lover, the parasite, the pander, and +the courtezan, were distinguished by their <anchor id="corr351"/><corr sic="appropiate">appropriate</corr> masks. +A particular physiognomy was considered as so essential to +each character, that it was thought, that without a proper +mask, a complete knowledge of the personage could not be +communicated. <q>In tragedies,</q> says Quintilian, <q>Niobe appears +with a sorrowful countenance—and Medea announces +her character by the fierce expression of her physiognomy—stern +courage is painted on the mask of Hercules, while that +of Ajax proclaims his transport and phrensy. In comedies, +the masks of slaves, pimps, and parasites—peasants, soldiers, +old women, courtezans, and female slaves, have each their +particular character<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Institut. Orator.</hi> Lib. XI. c. 3.</note>.</q> Julius Pollux, in his <hi rend="italic">Onomasticon</hi>, +has given a minute description of the mask appropriate to +every dramatic character<note place="foot">Lib. IV. c. 19.</note>. His work, however, was written +<pb n="352"/><anchor id="Pg352"/>in the reign of the Emperor Commodus, and his observations +are chiefly formed on the practice of the Greek theatre, so +that there may have been some difference between the various +masks he describes, and those of the Roman stage, towards +the end of the republic. The matron, virgin, and courtezan, +he informs us, were particularly distinguished from each other +by the manner in which their hair was arranged and braided. +The mask of the parasite had brown and curled hair: That +of the braggart captain had black hair, and a swarthy complexion<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Onomasticon</hi>, Lib. IV. c. 19. See also Scaliger, <hi rend="italic">Poet.</hi> Lib. I. c. 14, 15, 16.</note>; +and it farther appears from the engravings of masks +in Ficoroni, that he had a distended or inflated countenance. +The masks, likewise, distinguished the severe from the indulgent +father—the Micio from the Demea—and the sober youth +from the debauched rake<note place="foot">Quintil. <hi rend="italic">Instit. Orator.</hi> Lib. XI. c. 3.</note>. If, in the course of the comedy, +the father was to be sometimes pleased, but sometimes incensed, +one of the brows of his vizard was knit, and the other +smooth; and the actor was always careful, during the course +of the representation, to turn to the spectators, along with the +change of passion, the profile which expressed the feeling +predominant at the time<note place="foot">Ibid.</note>. Julius Pollux has also described +the dresses suited to each character: The youth was clad in +purple, the parasite in black, slaves in white, the pander in +party-coloured garments, and the courtezan in flowing yellow +robes<note place="foot"><hi rend="italic">Onomasticon</hi>, Lib. IV. c. 18. See also Stephens, <hi rend="italic">De Theatris</hi>.</note>. +</p> + +<p> +It would introduce too long discussion, were I to enter on +the much-agitated question concerning the advantages and +disadvantages of masks in theatric representations. The latter +are almost too apparent to be enlarged on or recapitulated. +It is obvious to remark, that though masks might do very well +for a Satyr and Cyclops, who have no resemblance to human +features, they are totally unsuitable for a flatterer, a miser, or +the like characters, which abound in our own species, in whom +the expression of countenance is more agreeable even than +the action, and forms a considerable part of the histrionic art. +Could we suppose that a vizard represented ever so naturally +the general humour of a character, it can never be assimilated +with the variety of passions incident to each person, in the +whole course of a play. The grimace may be proper on some +occasions, but it is too fixed and steady to agree with all. In +consequence, however, of the great size of the ancient theatres, +there was not so much lost by the concealment of the living +<pb n="353"/><anchor id="Pg353"/>countenance, as we are apt at first to suppose. It was impossible +that those alterations of visage, which are hidden by a +mask, could have been distinctly perceived by one-tenth of +the 40,000 spectators of a Roman play. The feelings portrayed +in the ancient drama were neither so tender nor versatile +as those in modern plays, and the actors did not require +the same flexibility of features—there were fewer flashes of +joy in sorrow, fewer gleams of benignity in hatred. Hercules, +the Satyrs, the Cyclops, and other characters of superhuman +strength or deformity, were more frequently introduced on the +ancient than the modern stage, and, by aid of the mask, were +more easily invested with their appropriate force or ugliness. +By means, too, of these masks, the dramatists introduced foreign +nations on the stage with their own peculiar physiognomy, +and among others, the <hi rend="italic">Rufi persona Batavi</hi>. Their use, besides, +prevented the frequenters of the theatre from seeing an +actor, far advanced in years, play the part of a young lover, +since the vizard, under which the performer appeared, was always, +to that extent at least, agreeable to the character he +assumed. In addition to all this, by concealing the mouth it +prevented the spectators from observing whence the sound +issued, and thus palliated the absurdity of one actor declaiming, +and the other beating time, as it were by gestures. Finally, +as the tragic actor was elevated by his <hi rend="italic">cothurnus</hi>, or +buskin, above the ordinary stature of man, it became necessary, +in order to preserve the due proportions of the human +form, that his countenance also should be enlarged to corresponding +dimensions. +</p> + + <milestone unit="tb" rend="rule: 40%"/> +<p> +I shall here close the first Volume of the <hi rend="font-variant: small-caps">History of Roman +Literature</hi>, in which I have treated of the Origin of the +Romans—the Progress of their Language, and the different +Poets by whom their Literature was illustrated, till the era of +Augustus. At that period Virgil beautifully acknowledges +the superiority of the Greeks in statuary, oratory, and science; +but he might, with equal justice, (and the avowal would have +come from him with peculiar propriety,) have confessed that +the Muses loved better to haunt Pindus and Parnassus, than +Soracte or the Alban Hill. From the days of Ennius downwards, +the literature and poetry of the Romans was, with exception, +perhaps, of satire, and some dramatic entertainments +<pb n="354"/><anchor id="Pg354"/>of a satiric description, wholly Greek—consisting merely of +imitations, and, in some instances, almost of translations from +that language. We may compare it to a tree transplanted in +full growth to an inferior soil or climate, and which, though +still venerable or beautiful, loses much of its verdure and +freshness, sends forth no new shoots, is preserved alive with +difficulty, and, if for a short time neglected, shrivels and decays. +</p> + <p rend="text-align: center; margin-top:2">END OF VOLUME I.</p> + <p rend="margin-top:2; font-size: small"> + <hi rend="italic">James Kay, Jun. Printer,<lb/>S. E. Corner of Race & Sixth Streets<lb/>Philadelphia.</hi> + </p> +</div> + + </body> + <back rend="page-break-before: right"> +<div> + <index index="toc" level1="Index"/><index index="pdf" level1="Index"/> +<head>INDEX</head> + +<list> +<item>Afranius, his Comedies, vol. i. p. <ref target="Pg170">170</ref>.</item> + +<item> +Agriculture, advantages of Italy for, ii. 6–11. +</item> + +<item> +Antias, Q. Valerius, Latin Annalist, ii. 74. +</item> + +<item> +Antipater, Cælius, Latin Annalist, ii. 72. +</item> + +<item> +Antonius, Marcus, character of his eloquence, ii. 117. +<list rend="nested"><item>His death, 119.</item></list> +</item> + +<item> +Arcesilaus founds the New Academy, ii. 208. +</item> + +<item> +Asellio, Sempronius, Latin Annalist, ii. 73. +</item> + +<item> +Atellane Fables, i. <ref target="Pg229">229</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Attius, his Tragedies, i. <ref target="Pg214">214</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Brutus, his Historical Epitomes, ii. 107. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Cæcilius, his Comedies, i. <ref target="Pg168">168</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Cæcina, his history, ii. 108. +</item> + +<item> +Cæsar compared with Xenophon, ii. 94. +<list rend="nested"><item>His Commentaries, 95–101.</item> +<item>His Ephemeris, whether the same work with his Commentaries, 101.</item> +<item>His Anticatones, 102.</item> +<item>His Analogia, 103.</item> +</list></item> + +<item> +Calvus, Licinius, his Epigrams, i. <ref target="Pg322">322</ref>. +<list rend="nested"><item>His orations, ii. 131.</item></list> +</item> + +<item> +Carmen Saliare, i. <ref target="Pg043">43</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Carneades teaches the Greek philosophy at Rome, ii. 211. +</item> + +<item> +Cato, the Censor, his work on Agriculture, ii. 12–16. +<list rend="nested"><item>His Orations, 16.</item> +<item>His work De Originibus, 18.</item> +<item>On Medicine, 20–21.</item> +</list></item> + +<item> +Catullus, i. <ref target="Pg271">271</ref>–<ref target="Pg320">320</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Cethegus, Marcus, an orator, ii. 110. +</item> + +<item> +Cicero, his Orations, ii. 152. +<list rend="nested"><item>Compared with Demosthenes, 192.</item> +<item>His works on Rhetoric, 193.</item> +<item>De Oratore, 195.</item> +<item>Brutus, 198.</item> +<item>The Orator, 199.</item> +<item>Topica, 200.</item> +<item>Rhetorica ad Herennium, inquiry concerning the author of, 202.</item> +<item>His philosophical works—De Legibus, 223.</item> +<item>De Finibus, 229.</item> +<item>Academica, 232.</item> +<item>Tusculanæ Disputationes, 236.</item> +<item>De <anchor id="corra61"/><corr sic="Natura">Naturâ</corr> Deorum, 243.</item> +<item>De Officiis, 257.</item> +<item>De Senectute, 259.</item> +<item>De Republica, 263.</item> +<item>His Epistles, 278.</item> +</list></item> + +<item> +Columna Rostrata, inscription on the, i. <ref target="Pg046">46</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Cotta, his style of oratory, ii. 122. +</item> + +<item> +Crassus, Lucius, character of his eloquence, ii. 120. +<list rend="nested"><item>His death, ibid.</item> +<item>Compared with Antony, 121.</item> +</list></item> +</list><list> +<item> +Decemviral Laws, ii. 134. +</item> + +<item> +Dialogue, remarks on this species of composition, ii. 194. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Eloquence, Roman, commencement of, ii. 109. +</item> + +<item> +Ennius, his tragedies, i. <ref target="Pg067">67</ref>. +<list rend="nested"><item>Annals, <ref target="Pg078">78</ref>.</item> +<item>Translation of Euhemerus, <ref target="Pg094">94</ref>.</item> +</list></item> + +<item> +Etruscans, their origin, i. <ref target="Pg020">20</ref>. +<list rend="nested"><item>Their conquests, <ref target="Pg026">26</ref>.</item> +<item>Religion, <ref target="Pg029">29</ref>.</item> +<item>Arts, <ref target="Pg035">35</ref>.</item> +</list></item> + +<item> +Eugubian Tables, i. <ref target="Pg047">47</ref>. +</item> + +</list><list> +<item> +Fabius Pictor, Latin Annalist, ii. 67–71. +</item> + +<item> +Fratres Arvales, hymn of the, i. <ref target="Pg043">43</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Galba, Sergius, an orator, ii. 110. +</item> + +<item> +Gracchi, oratory of the, ii. 113. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Hirtius, his continuation of Cæsar’s Commentaries, ii. 105. +</item> + +<item> +History, Roman, uncertainty of, ii. 57–67. +</item> + +<item> +Hortensius, his luxury and magnificence, ii. 124. +<list rend="nested"><item>His villas at Tusculum, Bauli, and Laurentum, 124, 125.</item> +<item>Character of his eloquence, 127.</item> +<item>His descendants, 130, Note.</item> +</list></item> +</list><list> +<item> +Jurisconsults, Roman, account of, ii. 138. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Laberius, i. <ref target="Pg328">328</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Lælius, his oratory compared with that of Scipio, ii. 111. +</item> + +<item> +Latin Language, its origin, i. <ref target="Pg032">32</ref>. +<list rend="nested"><item>Its changes, <ref target="Pg048">48</ref>.</item></list> +</item> + +<item> +Laws, Roman, ii. 133–138. +</item> + +<item> +Leges Regiæ, ii. 133. +</item> + +<item> +Livius Andronicus, i. <ref target="Pg054">54</ref>–<ref target="Pg058">58</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Lucceius, his History of the Social War, ii. 107. +</item> + +<item> +Lucilius, i. <ref target="Pg238">238</ref>–<ref target="Pg248">248</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Lucretius, i. <ref target="Pg250">250</ref>–<ref target="Pg271">271</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Lucullus, his patronage of learning, ii. 51. +</item> + +<item> +Luscius Lavinius, i. <ref target="Pg171">171</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Magna Græcia, its settlements, i. <ref target="Pg050">50</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Mimes, their origin and subjects, i. <ref target="Pg324">324</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Nævius, i. <ref target="Pg048">58</ref>–<ref target="Pg062">62</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Pacuvius, i. <ref target="Pg209">209</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Plautus, i. <ref target="Pg096">96</ref>–<ref target="Pg168">168</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Philosophy, Greek, introduction of, at Rome, ii. 209. +</item> + +<item> +Plebiscita, account of the, ii. 136. +</item> + +<item> +Prætor, account of the office of, ii. 141. +</item> + +<item> +Publius Syrus, i. <ref target="Pg332">332</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Quadrigarius, Claudius, Latin Annalist, ii. 73. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Sallust, his character, ii. 82. +<list rend="nested"><item>His Gardens, ibid.</item> +<item>His conspiracy of Catiline, and Jugurthine war, 84–88.</item> +<item>His Roman History, 92.</item> +</list></item> + +<item> +Satire, Roman, origin of, i. <ref target="Pg332">232</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +Senatusconsultum, what, ii. 137. +</item> + +<item> +Sisenna, Roman Annalist, ii. 75. +</item> + +<item> +Sulpicius, his worthless character, ii. 121. +<list rend="nested"><item>His style of oratory, 122.</item></list> +</item> + +<item> +Sylla, his library, ii. 50. +<list rend="nested"><item>His Memoirs of his Life, 77.</item> +<item>His character, 78.</item> +</list></item> +</list><list> +<item> +Terence, i. <ref target="Pg175">175</ref>–<ref target="Pg206">206</ref>. +<list rend="nested"><item>Compared with Plautus, <ref target="Pg206">206</ref>.</item></list> +</item> + +<item> +Theatre, Roman, its construction, i. <ref target="Pg337">337</ref>–<ref target="Pg353">353</ref>. +</item> + +<item> +<anchor id="corr348"/><corr sic="Tirannio">Tyrannio</corr>, his library, ii. 52. +</item> + +<item> +Trabea, i. <ref target="Pg173">173</ref>. +</item> +</list><list> +<item> +Varro, his farms and villas, ii. 25. +<list rend="nested"><item>His work on Agriculture, 28–34.</item> +<item>De Lingua Latina, 34.</item> +<item>Other works of Varro, 40.</item> +</list></item> +</list> + </div> + <div> + <pgIf output="pdf"> + <then/> + <else> + <div id="footnotes" rend="page-break-before: right"> + <head>Footnotes</head> + <divGen type="footnotes"/> + </div> + </else> + </pgIf> + </div> + <div rend="page-break-before: right; x-class: boxed"> + <index index="toc" level1="Transcriber's note"/><index index="pdf" level1="Transcriber's note"/> + <head>Transcriber’s Note</head> + <p>The table of contents has been added in the electronic version. +The index has been repeated from the second volume.</p> + <p>On page 49, the <ref target="corr049">second footnote</ref> is referenced twice; + on <ref target="corr312">page 312</ref>, a footnote is missing.</p> + <p>The book has many inconsistencies in spelling, capitalization or punctuation, + especially in the quotations from foreign languages, + where sometimes diacritical signs are missing or wrong. + They were not corrected or modernized, except in the following places which can be regarded as printing errors.</p> + <list> + <item><ref target="corrvi">page vi</ref>, <q>it</q> changed to <q>its</q></item> + <item><ref target="corrxiii">page xiii</ref>, <q>Abregee</q> changed to <q>Abregée</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr021">page 21</ref>, <q>antient</q> changed to <q>ancient</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr024">page 24</ref>, <q>harkened</q> changed to <q>hearkened</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr027">page 27</ref>, <q>agrandizement</q> changed to <q>aggrandizement</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr028">page 28</ref>, <q>Estruscans</q> changed to <q>Etruscans</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr029">page 29</ref>, <q>Guarnicci</q> changed to <q>Guarnacci</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr030">page 30</ref>, <q>vitious</q> changed to <q>vicious</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr032">page 32</ref>, <q>Schutz</q> changed to <q>Schütz</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr033">page 33</ref>, comma added following <q>Ginguené</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr037">page 37</ref>, <q>licenta</q> changed to <q>licentia</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr045">page 45</ref>, <q>feodera</q> changed to <q>fœdera</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr046">page 46</ref>, <q>the the</q> changed to <q>the</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr046a">page 46</ref>, <q>Gnavoid</q> changed to <q>Gnaivod</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr047">page 47</ref>, <q>Estruscan</q> changed to <q>Etruscan</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr048">page 48</ref>, <q>dipthong</q> changed to <q>diphthong</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr054">page 54</ref>, period added following <q>dell</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr055">page 55</ref>, italics removed from <q>Cicero</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr055a">page 55</ref>, <q>coeptum</q> changed to <q>cœptum</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr057">page 57</ref>, <q>where</q> changed to <q>were</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr060">page 60</ref>, <q>democrary</q> changed to <q>democracy</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr061">page 61</ref>, <q>Cyrian</q> changed to <q>Cyprian</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr064">page 64</ref>, <q>questor</q> changed to <q>quæstor</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr065">page 65</ref>, <q>Muller</q> changed to <q>Müller</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr065a">page 65</ref>, <q>furtur</q> changed to <q>fertur</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr066">page 66</ref>, <q>stongly</q> changed to <q>strongly</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr068">page 68</ref>, <q>translaed</q> changed to <q>translated</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr070">page 70</ref>, <q>Schonen</q> changed to <q>Schönen</q> and <q>Romern</q> to <q>Römern</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr071">page 71</ref>, <q>corse</q> changed to <q>corpse</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr072">page 72</ref>, <q>Hiedelberg</q> changed to <q>Heidelberg</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr087">page 87</ref>, <q>Gelius</q> changed to <q>Gellius</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr087a">page 87</ref>, <q>Attacinus</q> changed to <q>Atacinus</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr088">page 88</ref>, quote added before <q>Even</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr090">page 90</ref>, quote added following <q>Glaucum,</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr091">page 91</ref>, <q>.</q> changed to <q>,</q> following <q>Ennius</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr096">page 96</ref>, <q>conprehends</q> changed to <q>comprehends</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr101">page 101</ref>, <q>and and</q> changed to <q>and</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr153">page 153</ref>, <q>picturesqe</q> changed to <q>picturesque</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr154">page 154</ref>, <q>Lucretio.</q> changed to <q>Lucretio,</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr169">page 169</ref>, quote added following <q>nituerunt.</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr170">page 170</ref>, <q>coetûs</q> changed to <q>cœtûs</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr180">page 180</ref>, <q>enuuch</q> changed to <q>eunuch</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr190">page 190</ref>, <q>Schmeider</q> changed to <q>Schmieder</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr185">page 185</ref>, single quote changed to double quote added following <q>discours,</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr201">page 201</ref>, <ref target="corr319">319</ref>, + <ref target="corr333">333</ref> and <ref target="corr351">351</ref>, + <q>appropiate</q> changed to <q>appropriate</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr212">page 212</ref>, <q>Schönem</q> changed to <q>Schönen</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr216">page 216</ref>, quote added following <q>again.</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr216a">page 216</ref>, <q>oderunt dum metuunt</q> changed to <q>oderint dum metuant</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr227">page 227</ref>, quote added before <q>Attonitusque</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr228">page 228</ref>, double <q>and</q> removed before <q>epithets</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr231">page 231</ref>, period added following <q>c</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr231a">page 231</ref>, <q>Kunste</q> changed to <q>Künste</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr236">page 236</ref>, quote added following <q>piabant;</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr249">page 249</ref>, <q>Praef.</q> changed to <q>Præf.</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr257">page 257</ref>, <q>Cynogeticon</q> changed to <q>Cynegeticon</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr261">page 261</ref>, <q>Hine</q> changed to <q>Hinc</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr263">page 263</ref>, quote added following <q>cubandum est.</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr273">page 273</ref>, <q>16.</q> changed to <q>10.</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr278">page 278</ref>, <q>eumdem</q> changed to <q>eundem</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr290">page 290</ref>, <q>teritories</q> changed to <q>territories</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr291">page 291</ref>, <q>vestages</q> changed to <q>vestiges</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr295a">page 295</ref>, <q>powful</q> changed to <q>powerful</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr305">page 305</ref>, quote removed following <q>libido est,</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr312a">page 312</ref>, <q>verti</q> changed to <q>vertice</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr342">page 342</ref>, <q>woof</q> changed to <q>wool</q></item> + <item><ref target="corr344">page 344</ref>, <q>entremely</q> changed to <q>extremely</q></item> + </list> + <p>Some variant spellings were not changed (e. g. <q>truly</q> and <q>truely</q>, + <q>obscænus</q> and <q>obscœnus</q>, + <q>groundwork</q> and <q>ground-work</q>, + <q>tombstone</q> and <q>tomb-stone</q>).</p> + </div> + <div rend="page-break-before: right"> + <divGen type="pgfooter"/> + </div> + </back> + </text> +</TEI.2> |