Lucan, full of warmth and vehemence, eminently quotable, but, to speak
frankly, one whom, orators rather than poets should imitate.--
Quintilian, 10. 1. 90.
When I consider that Lucan died at twenty-six, I cannot help ranking him
among the most extraordinary men that ever lived.--
Macaulay.
The whole production (the _Pharsalia_) is youthful and unripe, but
indicative of genuine power.--Teuffel, Schwabe, and Warr, _History of
Roman Literature_, vol. 2, p. 78.
Lucan was born in Spain; was taken early to Rome; was carefully
educated; wrote much; and was much admired; but was disliked by Nero,
who forbade him to publish poems or recite them, and finally put him to
death on the charge of complicity in the conspiracy of Piso.
In philosophy Lucan was a Stoic, in style a rhetorician. The
_Pharsalia_, his only extant work, is an epic poem of about eight
thousand lines in ten books on the civil war between Pompey and Caesar.
The Cato of _Selections_ 2-5 is Cato the Younger, or 'the Stoic,' who in
46 B.C. was in Africa in command of a part of the Republican forces
opposed to Julius Caesar. After the decisive defeat at Thapsus he
refused to survive the Republic, taking his own life at Utica. His
memory was revered throughout antiquity and the Middle Ages. Vergil
makes him the lawgiver of Elysium (_Aeneid_, 8. 670), and Dante
represents him as the warden of Purgatory, 'venerable,' his countenance
adorned with the 'rays of the four consecrated stars,' his form destined
to shine brightly on the last day.
For her [i.e. Liberty] to thee not bitter
Was death in Utica, where thou didst leave
The vesture, that will shine so, the great day.
See Longfellow's translation of the _Purgatorio_, with notes, Canto I.
Haskins, _Lucani Pharsalia_, Introduction, pp. 59-60, examines all
allusions to Cato in the _Pharsalia_, and concludes that the picture is
in its main outlines truthful, though the failure to depict 'the
cross-grained perversity that moved the complaints of Cicero' makes it
somewhat one-sided. 'Of course the portrait is colored by a loving hand:
but it is none the worse for that.'
For Reference: Teuffel, Schwabe, and Warr, _History of Roman
Literature_, vol. 2, p. 78 ff. Haskins, _Lucani Pharsalia_ (London,
1889).
Metre: Dactylic Hexameter, B. 368; A. & G. 616.
_2._ 4. deis placuit: that Caesar 'had the strongest battalions' proves
that 'Heaven' was 'on his side.'
_3._ Cato, proceeding by land from the neighborhood of Cyrene toward
Numidia, and coming to the temple of Jupiter Ammon,--geographically
misplaced by Lucan,--is advised by Labienus to consult the god
concerning the outcome of the war and the nature of virtue. The
selection gives his reply. 1. mente gerebat: of. Seneca, _Epistula_ 4.
12 (41). 1, 2. 'God is near you, is with you, is within you. I have this
to say, Lucilius: a sacred spirit has his abode within us.' 3. Labiene:
Caesar's former second-in-command, who went over to Pompey's side at the
beginning of the Civil War and was finally slain at Munda. 5. et: even.
6, 7. Fortuna perdat minas: whether Fortune threatens vainly. 8.
et...honestum: and whether the right never grows more, right by success.
10. Haeremus ff.: We are in constant intercourse with heaven.--Haskins.
11. Sponte dei: by the inspiration of God.--Haskins. 12, 13.
dixit...licet: the inner light of conscience. auctor: the Creator.
15-17. These lines suggested the passage in Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey:
I have felt...a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean, and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things.
virtus: Grotius quotes Hierocles: 'God hath not upon earth a place more
truly his than the pure heart,' and the Pythian oracle: 'I joy in
reverent mortals even as in Olympus.' Superos...ultra: Why further do we
seek the gods? Iuppiter...moveris: All that you see, and all your
feelings, that is Jupiter.--Haskins. Cf. Seneca, _De Beneftciis_, 4. 8:
Quocumque te flexeris, ibi ilium videbis occurrentem tibi: nihil ab illo
vacat, opus suum ipse implet. 22. Servata fide: true to his word. 23.
populis: dative, to the multitude, i.e. of Orientals waiting to consult
the oracle.
_4._ 10. Fortuna fuit: i.e. was due to fortune rather than to virtue.
Fortuna is predicate nominative. 14. quam...Iugurthae: i.e. than to win
the victories of Marius.
_5._ This noble portrait is that of an ideal Stoic. Roman life had been
deeply imbued with this philosophy, which had passed beyond the limits
of the schools to become at once a religious creed and a practical code
of morals for everyday use. See Mackail, _Latin Literature_, p. 171. 2.
servare...tenere: to hold fast the mean, to observe the due limit. These
and the following phrases are Stoic formulae. 4. Cf. Seneca, _Epistula_
95 (15.3). 52-53, where he says 'we are members of a great body.' 'Let
this line be both in our hearts and on our lips:
"Human I am,
And every human interest is mine."'
See the entire passage. 12. sibi nata: selfish.