the Greek. His _Paulus_, 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 Roman 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.
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
_Hermione_—the exclamations of Ulysses, while writhing under the agony of
a recent wound, in the _Niptra_, and the following fine description of a
sea-storm introduced in the _Dulorestes_:—
“Interea, prope jam occidente sole, inhorrescit mare;
Tenebræ conduplicantur, noctisque et nimbûm occæcat nigror;
Flamma inter nubes coruscat, cœlum tonitru contremit,
Grando, mista imbri largifluo, subita turbine præcipitans cadit;
Undique omnes venti erumpunt, sævi existunt turbines,
Fervet æstu Pelagus.” ——
Such lines, however, as these, it must be confessed, are more appropriate
in epic, or descriptive poetry, than in tragedy.
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(340). 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.
Pacuvius, accordingly, had fewer imitators than Plautus. Indeed, for a
long period he had none of much note, except
ATTIUS,
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(341). 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(342),—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(343). Supposing this conversation took
place even when Cicero was so young as seventeen, Attius must have lived
at least to the age of eighty.
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 _Atreus_, 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(344). 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 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(345). 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(346). 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(347). 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(348).
Horace, in the same line where he celebrates the dramatic skill of
Pacuvius, alludes to the loftiness of Attius,—
—— “Aufert
Pacuvius docti famam senis—Attius alti;”
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:—
“Ennius arte carens, animosique Attius oris,
Casurum nullo tempore nomen habent.”
It would appear from Ovid likewise, that he generally chose atrocious
subjects for the arguments of his tragedies:—
“Nec liber indicium est animi, sed honesta voluptas,
Plurima mulcendis auribus apta ferens:
Attius esset atrox, conviva Terentius esset,
Essent pugnaces qui fera bella canunt(349).”
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 stories 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 _Medea_, 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:—
—— “Tanta moles labitur
Fremebunda ex alto, ingenti sonitu et spiritu
Præ se undas volvit, vortices vi suscitat,
Ruit prolapsa, pelagus respergit, reflat:
Ita num interruptum credas nimbum volvier,
Num quod sublime ventis expulsum rapi
Saxum, aut procellis, vel globosos turbines
Existere ictos, undis concursantibus?
Num quas terrestres pontus strages conciet;
Aut forte Triton fuscinâ evertens specus,
Subter radices penitus undanti in freto
Molem ex profundo saxeam ad cœlum vomit?”
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 _Epilogue to the Shepherd’s Calendar_, thus
describes his astonishment at the sight of a ship:—
“For as we stood there waiting on the strand,
Behold a huge great vessel to us came,
Dancing upon the waters back to land,
As if it scorn’d the danger of the same.
Yet was it but a wooden frame, and frail,
Glued together with some subtle matter:
Yet had it arms, and wings, and head, and tail,
And life, to move itself upon the water.
Strange thing! how bold and swift the monster was!
That neither cared for wind, nor hail, nor rain,
Nor swelling waves, but thorough them did pass
So proudly, that she made them roar again.”
Among the shorter fragments of Attius we meet with many scattered
sentiments, which have been borrowed by subsequent poets and moral
writers. The expression, “oderint dum metuant,” occurs in the _Atreus_.
Thus, too, in the _Armorum Judicium_,—
“Nam trophæum ferre me a forti pulchrum est viro;
Si autem et vincar, vinci a tali, nullum est probrum.”
A line in the same play—
“Virtuti sis par—dispar fortunis patris,”
has suggested to Virgil the affecting address—
“Disce, puer, virtutem ex me, verumque laborem;
Fortunam ex aliis: ——”
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—
“Quid est cur componere ausis mihi te, aut me tibi.”
In like manner, Ajax, in his speech in Ovid—
—— “Agimus, prô Jupiter, inquit,
Ante rates causam, et mecum confertur Ulysses!”
There are two lines in the _Philoctetes_, which present a fine image of
discomfort and desolation—
“Contempla hanc sedem, in qua ego novem hiemes, saxo stratus, pertuli,
Ubi horrifer aquilonis stridor gelidas molitur nives(350).”
Most of the plays of Attius, as we have seen, were taken from the Greek
tragedians. Two of them, however, the _Brutus_ and the _Decius_, 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 _De Divinatione_. 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—
“Nam quæ in vitâ usurpant homines, cogitant, curant, vident,
Quæque agunt vigilantes, agitantque, ea si cui in somno accidunt.
Minus mirum est ——”
In his tragedies, indeed, Attius rather shows a contempt for dreams, and
prodigies, and the science of augury—
“Nihil credo auguribus qui aures verbis divitant
Alienas, suas ut auro locupletent domos.”
The argument of Attius’ other drama, founded on a Roman subject, and
belonging to the class called _Prætextatæ_, 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 _Attius_—in the first place, because he twice
talks of following the example of his father—
“—— Patrio
Exemplo dicabo me, atque animam devotabo hostibus.”
And again—
“Quibus rem summam et patriam nostram quondam adauctavit pater.”
And, in the next place, he refers, in two different passages, to the
opposing host of the Gauls—
—— “Gallei, voce canora ac fremitu,
Peragrant minitabiliter ——
* * * * *
Vim Gallicam obduc contra in acie.” ——
Horace, as is well known, bestowed some commendation on those dramatists
who had chosen events of domestic history as subjects for their tragedies—
“Nec minimum meruere decus, vestigia Græca
Ausi deserere, et celebrare domestica facta(351).”
Dramas taken from our own annals, excite a public interest, and afford the
best, as well as easiest opportunity of attracting 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(352). “The most interesting subjects of tragedies,” says
Adam Smith(353), “are the misfortunes of virtuous and magnanimous kings
and princes;” 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.
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 _Œdipus_—
“Fatis agimur—cedite fatis:
Non solicitæ possunt curæ
Mutare rati stamina fusi.”
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.—“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(354).” His
reasons for supposing that this difference would have existed, are founded
on the difference in the mythological systems of the two
nations.—“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.”
There can be no doubt, 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 _sens
divinatoire et symbolique_, 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.—“Noster Ennius, qui magno plausu loquitur, assentiente
populo—Ego Deûm genus(355),” &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.
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
_vivendi preceptores_ rather than _rei actores_. Quintilian characterizes
Attius and Pacuvius as chiefly remarkable for this practice.—“Tragœdiæ
scriptores Attius et Pacuvius, clarissimi gravitate sententiarum.” A
question on this point is started by Hurd,—That since the Greek tragedians
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.
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(356):
“Turpem putat inscriptis metuitque lituram(357).”
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.
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 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.