His olim quibus et meus Catullus,
Et Calvus ——”(527)
VALERIUS ÆDITUUS,
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—
“Quid faculam præfers, Phileros, qua nil opu’ nobis?
Ibimus, hoc lucet pectore flamma satis.
Istam nam potis est vis sæva extinguere venti,
Aut imber cœlo candidus præcipitans:
At contra, hunc ignem Veneris, nisi si Venus ipsa,
Nulla ’st quæ possit vis alia opprimere(528).”
Aulus Gellius has also preserved the following verses of Porcius Licinius—
“Custodes ovium, teneræque propaginis agnûm,
Quæris ignem?—Ite huc: quæritis? ignis homo est.
Si digito attigero, incendam silvam simul omnem,
Omne pecus: flamma ’st omnia quæ video(529).”
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.
Accordingly, in the long period from the termination of the 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 MIMES, which now became
fashionable in Rome.
Though resembling them in name, the Latin Mimes differed essentially from
the Greek Μιμοι, 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(530);
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 _ballets_, 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,
(_Canticum saltabant_.)
It is much more difficult to distinguish the Mimes from the _Fabulæ
Atellanæ_, than from the Pantomimes or Greek _Mimi_; and indeed they have
been frequently confounded(531). It appears, however, that the characters
represented in the Atellane dramas were chiefly provincial, while those
introduced in the 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: “Toti,” says Vossius, “erant
ridiculi.” 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(532).
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—
“Sic iterat voces, et verba cadentia tollit;
Ut puerum sævo credas dictata magistro
Reddere, vel partes mimum tractare secundas.”
Some writers have supposed, that a Mime was a sort of _monodrame_, and
that the _partes secundæ_, here alluded to by Horace, meant the part of
the actor who gesticulated(533), while the other declaimed, or that of the
declaimer(534). It is quite evident, however, from the context of the
lines, that Horace refers to the inferior characters of the Mime(535). I
doubt not that the chief performer assumed more than one character in the
course of the piece(536), in the manner in which the Admirable Crichton is
recorded to have performed at the court of Mantua(537); 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:—“C. Volumnius,” says
Festus, “qui ad tibicinem saltârit, secundarum partium fuerit, qui, fere
omnibus Mimis, parasitus inducatur(538);” and to the same purpose
Petronius Arbiter,—
“Grex agit in scenâ Mimum—Pater ille vocatur,
Filius hic, nomen Divitis ille tenet(539).”
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(540).
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 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(541). Cornelius Gallus wrote four
books of _Elegies_ in praise of a Mime called Cytheris, who, as Aurelius
Victor informs us, was also beloved by Antony and Brutus—“Cytheridam
Mimam, cum Antonio et Gallo, amavit Brutus.” 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(542).
As might be expected from the characters introduced, the Mimes were
appropriated to a representation of the lowest follies and debaucheries of
the vulgar. “Argumenta,” says Valerius Maximus, “majore ex parte,
stuprorum continent actus.” 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 _Tristia_ of having been undeservedly
condemned for the freedom of his verses, asks—
“Quid si scripsissem Mimos obscœna jocantes?
Qui semper juncti crimen amoris habent;
In quibus assidue cultus procedit adulter,
Verbaque dat stulto callida nupta viro(543).”
We learn from another passage of Ovid that these were by much the most
popular subjects,—
“Cumque fefellit amans aliquâ novitate maritum,
Plauditur, et magno palma favore datur.”
The same poet elsewhere calls the Mimes, “Imitantes turpia Mimos;” and
Diomedes defines them to be “Sermonis cujuslibet, motûsque, sine
reverentiâ, vel factorum turpium cum lasciviâ imitatio, ita ut ridiculum
faciant.”
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 actors of them many acres of
the public land(544); 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 _gens togata_, and the _domini rerum_—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. “Strangely,” says Isaac Bey, while relating his adventures
in _France_, “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(545).”
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 DECIMUS LABERIUS and PUBLIUS SYRUS, who both
flourished during the dictatorship of Julius Cæsar.
LABERIUS.
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(546). 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—
“Ego, bis trecenis annis actis, sine notâ,
Eques Romanus lare egressus meo,
Domum revertar Mimus. Nimirum hoc die
Uno plus vixi mihi, quàm vivendum fuit.
Fortuna, immoderata in bono æque atque in malo,
Si tibi erat libitum, literarum laudibus
Floris cacumen nostræ famæ frangere,
Cur cum vigebam membris præ viridantibus,
Satisfacere populo, et tali cum poteram viro,
Non flexibilem me concurvàsti ut caperes?
Nunc me quo dejicis? quid ad scenam affero,
Decorem formæ, an dignitatem corporis?
Animi virtutem, an vocis jucundæ sonum?
Ut hedera serpens vires arboreas necat;
Ita me vetustas amplexu annorum enecat(547).”
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,
“Porro, Quirites, libertatem perdidimus;”
and shortly after, he added,
“Necesse est multos timeat, quem multi timent,”
on which the whole audience turned their eyes to Cæsar, who was present in
the theatre(548).
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 _planipedes_, 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!
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:—
“Non possunt primi esse omnes omni in tempore.
Summum ad gradum cum claritatis veneris,
Consistes ægre: et citius quam ascendas, decides.
Cecidi ego—cadet qui sequitur(549).” ——
Laberius did not long survive this double mortification: he retired from
Rome, and died at Puteoli about ten months after the assassination of
Cæsar(550).
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 occurrences 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(551)!
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—
“Democritus Abderites, physicus philosophus,
Clypeum constituit contra exortum Hyperionis;
Oculos effodere ut posset splendore æreo.
Ita, radiis solis aciem effodit luminis,
Malis bene esse ne videret civibus.
Sic ego, fulgentis splendore pecuniæ,
Volo elucificare exitum ætatis meæ,
Ne in re bonâ esse videam nequam filium(552).”
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(553). Horace seems to have considered an admiration of the
Mimes of Laberius as the consummation of critical folly(554). 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 _Plautinos sales_ and the Mimes 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
PUBLIUS SYRUS.
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(555). 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(556).
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.
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, 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(557). How such exalted precepts should have been grafted on the
lowest farce, and how passages, which would hardly be appropriate 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.
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.
“Amicos res opimæ pavant, adversæ probant.
Miserrima fortuna est quæ inimico caret.
Ingratus unus miseris omnibus nocet.
Timidas vocat se cautum, parcum sordidus.
Etiam oblivisci quid scis interdum prodest.
In nullum avarus bonus, in se pessimus.
Cuivis dolori remedium est patientia.
Honestus rumor alterum est patrimonium.
Tam deest avaro quod habet quam quod non habet.
O vita misero longa—felici brevis!”
This last sentiment has been beautifully, but somewhat diffusely expressed
by Metastasio:
“Perchè tarda è mai la morte
Quando è termine al martir?
A chi vive in lieta sorte
E sollecito il morir.”—_Artaserse_.
The same idea is thus expressed by La Bruyere: “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.” 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 and country, as
best suited his purpose. One of them only, he quotes to reprehend:
“Ita amicum habeas, posse ut fieri inimicum putes.”