CHAPTER XIII.

LIFE OF LIVY—HIS OBJECT IN WRITING HIS HISTORY—ITS SPIRIT AND

CHARACTER—LIVY PRECISELY SUITED TO HIS AGE—NOT WILFULLY INACCURATE—HIS

POLITICAL BIAS ACCOUNTED FOR—MATERIALS WHICH HE MIGHT HAVE USED—SOURCES

OF HIS HISTORY—HIS DEFECTS AS AN HISTORIAN—HIS

STYLE—GRAMMARIANS—VITRUVIUS POLLIO AN AUGUSTAN WRITER—CONTENTS OF HIS

WORK.

T. LIVIUS PATAVINUS (BORN B. C. 59.)

The biographical records of many great literary men of Rome are most

meager and unsatisfactory. Modern critics who have written their lives

have drawn largely upon their own imaginations for their materials;

whilst all the information to be derived from ancient writers is often

comprised in a few vague allusions and notices. Some of these have been

misunderstood, and from others unwarrantable deductions have been

derived. These observations are particularly applicable to him who is

the only illustrious Roman historian in the Augustan age.

Universal tradition assigns to Patavium (Padua) the honour of being the

birthplace of Titus Livius; but notwithstanding the general belief, some

doubt has been thrown upon the fact by an epigram of Martial.[958] He

came to Rome during the reign of Augustus, where he resided in the

enjoyment of the imperial favour and patronage.[959] He was a warm and

open admirer of the ancient institutions of the country, and esteemed

Pompey as one of its greatest heroes; but Augustus, with his usual

liberality, did not allow political opinions to interfere with the

regard which he entertained for the historian. Livy had a great

admiration for oratory, and advised his son to study the writings of

Demosthenes and Cicero.[960] At his recommendation the stupid Claudius

wrote history;[961] and it has even been asserted, though on

insufficient authority, that he was his instructor. His fame rapidly

spread beyond the limits of Italy, for Pliny the younger[962] relates

that an inhabitant of Cadiz came to Rome for the express purpose of

seeing him; a fact which St. Jerome[963] expands into an assertion that

many noble Gauls and Spaniards were attracted to the capital, far more

by the reputation of Livy than by the splendour of the imperial city.

His great work is a history of Rome, which he modestly terms “Annals,”

in one hundred and forty-two books, preceded by a brief but

elaborately-written preface,[964] and extending from the earliest

traditions to the death of Drusus.[965] Of this history thirty-five

books are extant, which were discovered at different periods.[966] Of

the rest we have only dry and meager epitomes, drawn up by some

uncertain author, and of these two are lost.[967]

Besides his History, Livy is said[968] to have written books which

professed to be philosophical, and dialogues, the subjects of which are

partly philosophical, and partly historical. Late in life he returned to

Patavium, and there died A. D. 18, in the seventy-seventh year of his

age.[969] He left one son, and one daughter who married L. Magius, a

teacher of rhetoric, of no great talent, who owed his reputation

principally to his connexion with the historian.[970] Livy had one great

object in view in writing his History, namely, to celebrate the glories

of his native country, to which he was devotedly attached. He was a

patriot: his sympathy was with Pompey, called forth by the

disinterestedness of that great man, and perhaps by his sad end, after

having so long enjoyed universal popularity. The character of the

historian would lead us to suppose that his attachment was personal

rather than political, for the general spirit of his work shows that he

was a man of pure mind and gentle feelings. He began his great work

about nine or ten years before the Christian era, a period singularly

favourable for such a design. The passages in which especially he

delights to put forth his powers, and on which he dwells with the

greatest zest, show the truth of Quintilian’s well-known criticism,

“that he is especially the historian of the affections, particularly of

the softer sensibilities.”[971] A lost battle is misery to him; he

trembles at the task of relating it. Nor does he appear to have been a

stern republican. He could admire enthusiastically, and describe with

spirit, the noble qualities and self-devotion which the old republican

freedom fostered; but his object is rather to paint the heroes, and to

give graphic representations of the struggles which they maintained in

defence of liberty, than to show any love of liberty in the abstract, or

a predilection for any particular form of constitution. To Livy

political struggles were no more than subjects for picturesque

delineations, the moral of which was the elevation of national grandeur,

just as successful foreign wars were the records of national glory.

Hence he is a biographer quite as much as an historian: he anatomizes

the moral nature of his heroes, and shows their inner man, and the

motive springs of their noble exploits. This gives to his narratives the

charm of an historical romance, and makes up for the want of accurate

research and political observation. His characters stand before us

objectively, like epic heroes; and thus he is “the Homer of the Roman

people,” whilst the charm of his narratives makes him the “Herodotus of

Roman historians.”

Rome was now the mistress of the world: her struggles with foreign

nations had been rewarded with universal dominion; so that when the

Roman empire was spoken of, no title less comprehensive than “the world”

(_orbis_) would satisfy the national vanity. The horrors of civil war

had ceased, and were succeeded by an amnesty of its bitter feuds and

bloody animosities. Liberty indeed had perished, but the people were no

longer fit for the enjoyment of it; and it was exchanged for a mild and

paternal rule, under which all the refinements of civilization were

encouraged, and its subjects could enjoy undisturbed the blessings of

peace and security.

Rome, therefore, had rest and breathing-time to look back into the

past—to trace the successive steps by which that marvellous edifice, the

Roman empire, had been constructed. She could do this, too, with perfect

self-complacency, for there was no symptom of decay to check her

exultation, or to mar the glories which she was contemplating.

Livy, the good, the affectionate, the romantic, was precisely the

popular historian for such times as these. His countrymen looked

naturally for panegyric rather than for criticism. They were not in a

temper to bear one who could remorselessly tear open and expose to view

all the faults and blemishes which blotted the pages of their history;

who could be a morose and querulous praiser of times gone by, never to

return, at the expense of their present greatness and prosperity. He

lived in happy times, before Rome had learnt by sad experience what the

tyranny of absolutism really was. He tells his story like a bard singing

his lay at a joyous and festive meeting, chequered by alternate

successes and reverses, prosperity and adversity, but all tending to a

happy end at last. These features of his character, and this object of

his work, whilst they constitute his peculiar charm as a narrator,

obviously render him less valuable as an historian. Although he was not

tasteless and spiritless, like Dionysius, he was not so trustworthy. He

would not be wilfully inaccurate, or otherwise than truth-telling; but

if the legend he was about to tell was captivating and interesting, he

would not stop to inquire whether or not it was true. He would take upon

trust the traditions which had been handed down from generation to

generation without inquiry; and the more flattering and popular they

were, the more suitable would he deem them for his purpose. Without

being himself necessarily superstitious, he would see that superstitious

marvels added to the embellishments of his story, and, therefore, would

accept them without pronouncing upon their truth or falsehood.

Wilful unfairness can never be attributed to Livy: he was prejudiced,

but he was not party-spirited. He loved his country and his countrymen,

and could scarcely persuade himself of the possibility of their doing

wrong. He could scarcely believe anything derogatory to the national

glory. When (to take a striking example,) in the case of the treaty with

Porsena, there were two opposite stories, he was led by this partiality

to ignore the well-authenticated fact of the capture of Rome, and to

adopt that account which was most creditable to his countrymen.[972]

Whenever Rome was false to treaties, unmerciful in victory, or

unsuccessful in arms, he is always anxious to find excuses. His

predilections are evidently aristocratic; and although he states the

facts fairly, he wishes his reader to sympathize with the patricians.

The plebeians of the days in which he lived were not the fair

representatives of that enterprising class in the early ages of the

republic, who were as well born as the patricians, although of different

blood; the strength and sinews of the state in its exhausting

wars—dependent only upon them from stern necessity, because they were

ground down to the dust by poverty, and debt, and oppression, but

independently maintaining themselves by their own industry, gradually

acquiring wealth, rising to the position of a middle class, winning

their way perseveringly, step by step, to political privileges.

The lower orders of Rome, in the time of Livy—for the term plebeian, in

its original sense, was no longer applicable—were debased and degraded;

they cared not for liberty or political power, or self-government; their

bosoms throbbed not with sympathy for the old plebeians, who retired to

Mount Sacer, and shed their blood for their principles. It was

difficult, therefore, for him not to believe that the popular leaders of

old times were unprincipled men, who sought to repair their fortunes by

the arts of the demagogue. In his eyes resistance to tyranny was treason

and rebellion.[973] But when, as in the story of Virginia, his gentler

affections were enlisted, Livy’s heart warmed with a generous admiration

towards the champions of the people’s rights, and his political

predilections gave way to his sensibilities. In treating of history

almost contemporaneous, Tacitus confesses his liberality. Although it

might have rendered him more acceptable at the court of his patron if he

had vilified his political foes, yet even imperial favour, acting on the

same side as political prejudice, did not tempt him to unfairness.[974]

He could see and acknowledge noble qualities and disinterested

patriotism, and give credit for sincere motives, even to those who

differed in political opinions.

From a character such as has been described, much care is not to be

expected as to the sources from which historical information was

derived. Many original documents must have existed in his day, which he

evidently never took the trouble to consult. A rich treasure of original

monuments relating to foreign and domestic affairs were ready at hand,

which might have been examined without much trouble.[975] The great

Annals of the Pontifex Maximus were digested into eighty books; and

these contained the names of the magistrates, all memorable events at

home and abroad—even the very days on which they occurred being marked.

The commentaries not only of the priests and augurs, but of the civil

magistrates, were kept with exactness and regularity. There is no reason

for supposing that the _Libri Lintei_[976] were lost in Livy’s time,

although he quotes from Licinius Macer,[977] instead of consulting them

himself. Three thousand brazen tablets, on which were engraved acts of

the senate and the plebeians, extending backwards (says Suetonius[978])

almost to the building of the city, existed in the Capitol until it was

burnt in the reign of Vespasian. The corpus of civil law, which is known

to have existed in the time of Cicero,[979] was full of antiquarian

lore; and the twelve tables furnished invaluable information, not only

on language, but on the manners and habits of bygone times. Nevertheless

the fragments of the _Leges Regiæ_ and the laws of the twelve tables

have been more carefully examined by critics of modern times than they

were by Livy, when they existed in a more perfect condition.

Lachmann[980] has satisfactorily shown that the assertions of Livy are

not based upon personal investigation, but that he trusted to the

annalists, and took advantage of the researches of preceding historians.

This is all that he himself professes to do; and even these professions

he does not always satisfactorily perform. He does not appear to have

profited by the Annals of Varro or the _Origines_ of Cato, a work which,

according to the testimony of Cicero, must have been invaluable to an

historian; and although the Archæologia of Dionysius were published

about the time at which Livy commenced his history,[981] there is no

evidence that he makes use of it; certainly he never acknowledges any

obligation to the indefatigable researches of the Greek historian.

According to his own confession,[982] Roman history is total darkness

until the capture of Rome by the Gauls; and although a dim light then

begins to break, a twilight period succeeds, which continues until the

first Punic war. But it cannot be asserted that he prepared himself for

his difficult task as he ought, or took advantage of all the means at

his disposal to enlighten the obscurity in which his subject was

involved. The authorities on which he principally depends for the

contents of the first Decade were such as Ennius, Fab. Pictor, Cincius,

and Piso. It is evident that he also consulted Greek writers. In the

third, which contains the most beautiful and elaborate passages of the

whole work, he follows Polybius. Nor could he, in this portion of his

history, follow a safer one. The Romans, notwithstanding all their

practical tendencies, did little to promote geographical science. It is

amongst the Greeks that we find the most accurate and indefatigable

geographers, such as were Polybius, Strabo, and Ptolemy.

Polybius prepared himself for the task of narrating the Italian campaign

of Hannibal by personal inspection. Livy did nothing of the kind. The

former travelled through the Alpine passes; and his authority was

considered so good that Strabo implicitly followed him. It is to be

lamented that, as he was writing to his countrymen, he seldom mentions

the name of places; probably he thought they would not be the wiser for

the enumeration of unknown barbarian names. But his accuracy in dates

and distances enables us to trace Hannibal’s route with correctness.

These prove that the passage of Hannibal was by the Alpis Graia, the

Little St. Bernard; a statement which had been made by that

veracious[983] historian, Cælius Antipater, and also by Cornelius

Nepos.[984] It has been since confirmed by the researches of modern

travellers, such as General Melville, M. de Luc, Cramer, and Wickham.

Strange to say, Livy, although following the route marked out by

Polybius almost step by step, at length ends it with the Alpis Cottia

(M. Genevre.) The absence of names left the fireside traveller at fault.

Cæsar[985] had crossed the Alps by that pass; and, perhaps, Livy named

it at a venture, as the most familiar to him. In the succeeding portions

of his work, so complete is the confidence which he reposes upon the

guidance of Polybius, that the fourth and fifth Decades are little more

than the history of Polybius paraphrased.

Niebuhr,[986] from internal evidence, gives an interesting account of

the manner in which it is probable that Livy wrote his history. He

supposes that, like most of the ancients, he employed a secretary, who

read to him from existing authorities the events of a single year. These

the historian mentally arranged, and then dictated his own narrative.

The work, therefore, was composed in portions; the connexion of the

events of one year with those of the preceding one was lost sight of,

and thus they seem isolated; and the conclusion of a series of events

sometimes unaccountably synchronizes with the conclusion of a year.

To his deficiencies in the habit of diligent and accurate investigation

are added others which singularly disqualify him for the task of a

faithful historian. He was a reader of books rather than a student of

men and things; he took upon trust what other people told him, instead

of acquiring knowledge in a practical manner. He was ill-acquainted with

the history of foreign countries. He was not, like Cæsar, a soldier; and

therefore his descriptions of military affairs are often vague and

indistinct, for he did not understand the tactics which he professed to

describe. He was not, like Thucydides, a politician or a philosopher;

and hence the little trustworthy information which we derive from him on

questions connected with constitutional changes. He did not fit himself,

like Herodotus, by travelling; and thus he is often ignorant of the

localities which he describes, even though they are within the limits of

Italy. Hence the difficulties in the way of understanding the route of

Hannibal and his army across the Alps, the battle of Thrasimene, and the

defeat at the Caudine Forks. He was not a philosopher, a lawyer, or a

politician: he could embrace with the eye and depict with the hand of an

artist everything which was external and tangible; but he could not

penetrate the secret motives which actuate the human will, nor form a

clear conception of the fundamental, legal and political principles

which animated the institutions, and gave rise to the peculiarities, of

Roman constitutional history.

With respect to the speeches which he attributes to his principal

heroes, a greater degree of accuracy cannot be expected, than is found

in those of Thucydides. But they do not possess that verisimilitude

which is so admirable in those of the Greek historian. As works of art

they are faultless, but Livy does not keep in view the principle adhered

to by Thucydides, that they should be such as the speakers were likely

to have delivered on the occasions in question. His great authority,

Polybius, disapproves of imaginary speeches altogether;[987] but it must

be remembered that, without some oratorical display, he would not have

pleased the Roman people. The speeches of Thucydides, although they bear

the stamp of the writer’s mind, are, to a certain extent, characteristic

of the speaker, and seem inspired by the occasion. If a Spartan speaks,

he is laconic; if a general, he is soldier-like; if a statesman or

demagogue, he is logical or argumentative, or appeals to the feelings

and passions of the Athenian people. Consistency produces variety. The

speeches of Livy are pleasing and eloquent,[988] but they are always, so

to speak, Livian; they are frequently not such as Romans would have

spoken in times when eloquence was rude, though forcible. They partake

of the rhetorical and declamatory spirit, which was already beginning to

creep over Roman literature; and often, from being unsuitable to time,

place, and person, diminish, instead of heightening, the dramatic

effect.

Such are the principal defects which cause us to regret that, whilst

Livy charms us with his romantic narratives and almost faultless style,

he is too often a fallacious guide as an historian, and gives, not

intentionally or dishonestly, but from the character of his mind, and

the object which he proposed to himself, a false colouring or a vague

and inaccurate outline to the events which he narrates. No one can avoid

relishing the liveliness, freshness, and “lactea ubertas,” of Livy’s

fascinating style; but its principal excellence is summed up in the

expression of Quintilian, “_clarissimus candor_,” (brightness and

lucidity.[989]) On the authority of Asinius Pollio, quoted by the same

writer,[990] a certain fault has been attributed to him, termed

“Patavinity,” _i. e._, some peculiar ideas not admissible in the purest

Latin, which mark the place of his nativity. So little pains do people

take in the investigation of truth, and so ready are they to take upon

trust what their predecessors have believed before them, that generation

after generation have assumed that Livy’s clear, eloquent, and

transparent style is disfigured by what we term provincialisms.[991] The

penetrating mind of Niebuhr finds no ground for believing the story. If

there is any truth in it, he supposes the criticism must have applied to

his speaking, and not to his writing.[992] His style is always

classical, even in the later decades: though prolix and tautologous, it

is invariably marked by idiomatic purity and grammatical accuracy.

GRAMMARIANS.

The grammarians may be passed over with little more notice than the

simple mention of their names, because, although they contributed to the

stock of their country’s literature, they added little or nothing to its

literary reputation. The most conspicuous amongst them were—Atteius

Philologus, a freedman and friend of Sallust; Staberius Eros, who taught

Brutus and Cassius; Q. Cæcilius Epirota, the correspondent of Cicero; C.

Julius Hyginus, a Spaniard, the friend of Ovid, and curator of the

Palatine library; Verrius Flaccus, the tutor to the grandsons of

Augustus; Q. Cornificius, who was augur at the same time with Cicero;

and P. Nigidius Figulus, an orator and philosopher as well as a

grammarian.

M. VITRUVIUS POLLIO.

The distinguished name of M. Vitruvius Pollio claims a place in a

catalogue of the Augustan writers. His subject, indeed, belongs to the

apartment of the fine arts; but his varied acquirements and extensive

knowledge, as well as the manner in which, notwithstanding some faults,

he treats his subject, shed some lustre upon Roman literature, and stamp

him as one of the didactic writers of his country.

Little information exists respecting this celebrated architect; and this

circumstance has led to his being confounded with another professor of

the same art, L. Vitruvius Cerdo. The name of the latter is thus

inscribed on an arch, which was his work, at Verona:[993] “Q. Vitruvius

L. L. Cerdo, Architectus.” That Cerdo was not the author of the treatise

extant under the name of Vitruvius, may be satisfactorily

proved:—Firstly. The letters L. L. signify that he was Lucii Libertus

(the freedman of Lucius,) whereas M. Vitruvius Pollio was born free.

Secondly. The arch on which the name appears belongs to an age when the

Romans had begun, in defiance of the precepts of Pollio, to neglect the

principles of Greek architecture.[994]

Both the place and date of his birth are unknown. According to some

authorities he was born at Verona; according to others at Formiæ;[995]

but he himself asserts that he received a good liberal education; and

the truth of this statement is confirmed by the knowledge which he

displays of Greek and Roman literature, and his acquaintance with works

which treat, not only of architecture, but also of polite learning and

even philosophy[996]—the writings, for example, of Lucretius, Cicero,

and Varro. But the great object of his studies was, undoubtedly,

professional, and to this he made literature a handmaid.

Vitruvius served under Julius Cæsar in Africa as a military engineer;

and was subsequently employed by one of the emperors, to whom his

treatise is dedicated, in the direction and control of that department

of the public service. By his favour, and the kindness of his sister, he

was thus placed in a condition, if not of affluence, at least of

competency. Who his imperial patron was has been disputed; but the

widely extended conquests, the augmentation of the empire, the political

institutions, and, moreover, the taste for architecture which Vitruvius

attributes to him, renders it most probable that it was Augustus, the

sovereign who found the city of bricks and left it of marble. It is

clear that his work was written after the death of Julius Cæsar, and not

later than that of Titus, for the former he prefixes the word Divus,

whilst he does not mention the Coliseum; and, although he speaks of

Vesuvius,[997] he is evidently not aware of any eruptions having taken

place except in ancient times. Notwithstanding the arguments adduced by

W. Newton[998] to prove that he wrote in the reign of Titus, it is now

universally admitted that Vitruvius was a writer of the Augustan age.

The inferiority of his style to that of his contemporaries, its

occasional obscurity and want of method, the not unfrequent occurrence

of inelegant, and even barbarous expressions, notwithstanding his

classical education, may be accounted for by what has already been

stated respecting the professional object of all his studies. He himself

claims indulgence on this score,[999] and states that he writes as an

architect, and not as a literary man. So much of its difficulty as

arises from conciseness he considers a matter for boasting rather than

apology.

In forming an estimate of the Latinity of an author like Vitruvius, it

must not be forgotten that our taste is formed by authority and by a

study of the best models. Novelty is exceptional, and therefore

displeases. But technical subjects render not only the introduction of

new terms necessary, but even, owing to the poverty of language, awkward

periphrases and obscure phraseology. Nevertheless, upon the whole, the

language of Vitruvius is vigorous, his descriptions bold, and seem the

work of a true and correct hand, and a practised draughtsman.

His work consists of ten books, in which he treats of the whole subject

in a systematic and orderly manner.

The following are its principal contents:—A general view of the science

and of the education suitable to an architect; the choice of sites; the

arrangement of the buildings and fortifications of a city;[1000] an

interesting essay on the earliest human dwellings, building

materials,[1001] temples, altars,[1002] forums, basilicæ, treasuries,

jails, court-houses, baths, palæstræ, harbours, theatres, together with

their acoustic principles, and the theory of musical sounds and

harmonies.[1003] Private dwellings, both in town and country;[1004]

decoration;[1005] water, and the means of supply;[1006] chronometrical

instruments;[1007] surveying[1008] and engineering, both civil and

military.

His work is valuable as a conspectus of the principles of Greek

architectural taste and beauty, of which he was a devoted admirer, and

from which he would not willingly have permitted any deviation. But he

was evidently deficient in the knowledge of the principles of Greek

architectural construction.[1009] His taste was pure, too pure probably

for the Romans; for, notwithstanding his theoretical excellence, we have

no evidence of his being employed, practically, as an architect, except

in the case of the Basilica,[1010] at Colonia Julia Fanestris, now Fano,

near Ancona.

BOOK III.

ERA OF THE DECLINE.

CHAPTER I.

DECLINE OF ROMAN LITERATURE—IT BECAME DECLAMATORY—BIOGRAPHY OF

PHÆDRUS—GENUINENESS OF HIS FABLES—MORAL AND POLITICAL LESSONS INCULCATED

IN THEM—SPECIMENS OF FABLES—FABLES SUGGESTED BY HISTORICAL

EVENTS—SEJANUS AND TIBERIUS—EPOCH UNFAVOURABLE TO LITERATURE—INGENUITY

OF PHÆDRUS—SUPERIORITY OF ÆSOP—THE STYLE OF PHÆDRUS CLASSICAL.

With the death of Augustus[1011] commenced the decline of Roman

literature, and only three illustrious names, Phædrus, Persius, and

Lucan, rescue the first years of this period from the charge of a

corrupt and vitiated taste. After awhile, indeed, political

circumstances again became more favourable—the dangers which paralyzed

genius and talent, and prevented their free exercise under Tiberius and

his tyrannical successors, diminished, and a more liberal system of

administration ensued under Vespasian and Titus. Juvenal and Tacitus

then stood forth as the representatives of the old Roman independence;

vigour of thought communicated itself to the language; a taste for the

sublime and beautiful to a certain extent revived, although it did not

attain to the perfection which shed a lustre over the Augustan age.

The characteristic of the first literature of this epoch was declamation

and rhetoric. As liberty declined, true natural eloquence gradually

decayed. When it is no longer necessary or even possible to persuade or

convince the people, that eloquence which calms the passions, wins the

affections, or appeals to common sense and the reasoning powers, has no

opportunity for exercise. Its object is a new one—namely, to please and

attract an audience who listen in a mere critical spirit: the weapons

which it makes use of are novelty and ingenuity; novelty soon becomes

strangeness, and strangeness exaggeration; whilst ingenuity implies

unnatural study and a display of pedantic erudition—the aiming at

startling and striking effects—and at length ends in affectation.

If this was the prevailing false taste under the immediate successors of

Augustus, it is not surprising that it affected poetry as well as prose;

and that the principal talent of the poet lay in florid and diffuse

descriptions, whilst his chief fault was a style overladen with

ornament. The tragedies ascribed to Seneca are theatrical declamations;

the satires of Persius are philosophical declamations; whilst the poems

of Lucan and Silius Italicus, though epic in form, are nothing more than

descriptive poems, and their style is rather rhetorical than poetical.

PHÆDRUS.

Fable had been long known and popular amongst the Romans before the time

of Phædrus. Livy could not have attributed the well-known one to

Menenius Agrippa, unless it had been a familiar tradition of long

standing. Fables amused the guests of Horace, and furnished subjects to

those of Ovid. In this, as in other fields of literature, Rome was an

imitator of Greece; but nevertheless the Roman fabulist struck out a new

line for himself, and in his hands fable became, not only a moral

instructor, but a severe political satirist. Phædrus, the originator and

only author of Roman fable, flourished on the common confines of the

golden and the silver age. His mode of thought, as well as the events

which suggested both his original illustrations and his adaptations of

the Æsopean stories, belong to that epoch of transition. His works are,

as it were, isolated: he has no contemporaries. Although he was born in

the reign of Augustus, he wrote when the Augustan age had passed away.

Nevertheless his solitary voice was lifted up when those of the poet,

the historian, and the philosopher were silenced.

Phædrus, like Horace, is his own biographer; and the only knowledge

which we have respecting his life is furnished by his Fables. In the

prologue to the third book he informs us that he was a native of Thrace:

“I,” he says, “to whom my mother gave birth on the Pierian hill—

Ego quem Pierio mater enixa est jugo.”

And, again, he exclaims, “Why should I, who am nearer to lettered

Greece, desert for slothful indolence the honour of my fatherland, when

Thrace can reckon up her poets, and Apollo is the parent of Linus, the

muse of Orpheus, who by his song endowed rocks with motion, tamed the

wild beasts, and stopped the rapid Hebrus with welcome delay?—

Ego literatæ qui sum propior Græciæ,

Cur somno inerti deseram patriæ decus;

Threïssa cum gens numeret auctores suos,

Linoque Apollo sit parens, Musa Orpheo

Qui saxa cantu movit, et domuit feras,

Hebrique tenuit impetus dulci morâ?”

From the title, “Augusti Libertus,” prefixed to his fables, it is clear

that he adds one more distinguished name to that list of freedmen, who

were celebrated in the annals of literature. Although, in the preface to

his work, he modestly terms himself only a translator of Æsop,

Æsopus auctor quam materiam repperit

Hanc ego polivi versibus senariis,[1012]

still, for many of his fables, he deserves the credit of originality.

Probably he enlarged and extended his original plan; for he afterwards

speaks of simply adopting the style and not the matter of the Æsopean

fable.[1013]

He does not appear to have gained much fame or popularity; for he is

only twice mentioned by ancient authorities, namely, by Martial[1014]

and Seneca.[1015] The latter, writing to Polybius, a favourite freedman

of Claudius, encourages him to enter upon the field which Phædrus

already occupied, asserting that fables in the style of Æsop constituted

a work hitherto unattempted by Roman genius (_intentatum Romanis

ingeniis opus_.) Either, therefore, the fables of Phædrus were little

known and appreciated, or Seneca purposely concealed from the Emperor’s

favourite the fact of their existence, in order to flatter him with the

hopes of his thus becoming the first Roman writer in his style. The

persecution to which literary men were subject under the worst Emperors,

of which Phædrus hints obscurely that he was a victim[1016]—the perils

to which he would have been exposed by strictures upon persons in power,

which, concealed under the veil of fiction, appear now dark and

enigmatical, but which might have spoken plainly to the consciences of

the actors themselves—probably rendered it a wise precaution to conceal

his works during his lifetime; hence they would be little known, except

to a chosen few, and the few copies made of them would account for the

rarity of the extant manuscripts.

Owing to the deficiency of ancient testimony, the genuineness of the

Fables has been disputed; but the purity of style, and the natural

allusions to contemporary events render it almost certain that they

belong to the age in which they were supposed to have been written. No

one but a contemporary could have written the fable commencing—

Narrabo memoria quod factum est mea.[1017]

The prologue to the third book evidently speaks of the author’s own

calamities; and the way in which the name of Sejanus is connected with

the event, hints, although obscurely, that that prime minister of

tyranny was the author of his sufferings. It is scarcely probable that

he would have ventured to attack Sejanus during his lifetime. It may,

therefore, be assumed that Phædrus lived beyond the eighteenth year of

the reign of Tiberius, in which year Sejanus died.

The original manuscript followed in the early editions of Phædrus was

discovered in the tenth century: it contained ninety-seven fables,

divided into five books. But N. Perotto, an archbishop of Manfredonia,

in the fifteenth century, published a miscellaneous collection of Latin

fables, and amongst them were thirty-two new fables attributed to

Phædrus, which were not found in the older editions. These were at first

supposed to have been written by Perotto himself; but the manifest

inferiority of some poems known to be the work of the archbishop, and

the Augustan purity of style which marks the newly-discovered fables,

leave little doubt of their genuineness. Consequently, they were

published by Angelo Mai as supplementary to those which had already

appeared.

The circumstances of the times in which he lived suggested the moral and

prudential lessons which his fables inculcated. The bane of Rome, under

the empire, was the public informer (_delator_,) as the sycophant had

been the pest of Athens. Life and conduct, private as well as public,

were exposed to a complete system of espionage: no one was safe from

this formidable inquisition; a man’s familiar associate might be in

secret his bitterest enemy. But the principal victims were the rich:

they were marked out for destruction, in order that the confiscation of

their property might glut the avarice of the Emperor and the informers.

For this reason, Phædrus himself professes always to have seen the peril

of acquiring wealth—

Periculosum semper reputavi lucrum.

And we cannot be surprised that the danger of riches, and the

comparative safety of obscurity and poverty, should sometimes form the

moral of his fables.

That of the Mules and the Thieves, which is entirely his own, teaches

this lesson:—

Muli gravati sarcinis ibant duo;

Unus ferebat fiscos cum pecuniâ,

Alter tumentes multo saccos hordeo.

Ille, onere dives, celsâ cervice eminet,

Clarumque collo jactat tintinnabulum;

Comes quieto sequitur et placido gradu.

Subito latrones ex insidiis advolant,

Interque cædem ferro mulum sauciant,

Diripiunt nummos, negligunt vile hordeum.

Spoliatus igitur cum casus fleret suos,

Equidem, inquit alter, me contemptum gaudeo,

Nam nihil amisi nec sum læsus vulnere.

Hoc argumento tuta est hominum tenuitas;

Magnæ periclo sunt opes obnoxiæ.[1018]

“Two mules, laden with heavy burdens, were journeying together: one

carried bags of money; the other, sacks filled with barley. The former,

proud of his rich load, carried his head high, and made the bell on his

neck sound merrily; his companion followed with quiet and gentle paces.

On a sudden, some thieves rush from an ambuscade, wound the

treasure-mule, strip him of his money-bags, but leave untouched the

worthless barley. When, therefore, the sufferer bewailed his sad

case—‘For my part,’ replied his companion, ‘I rejoice that I was treated

with contempt; for I have no wounds, and have lost nothing.’ The subject

of this fable proves that poverty is safe, whilst great wealth is

exposed to peril.”

The fable of the Man and the Ass teaches a salutary lesson to another

class of wealthy men, namely, those favourites of the emperor and his

creatures, who owed their wealth to plunder and confiscation. Every

day’s experience proved that those who battened on the spoils of the

oppressed one day, became themselves the victims of the same tyrannical

system the next. Like that of the prime minister, Sejanus himself, the

sun of their prosperity was destined to set, and their ill-gotten spoil

to enrich others as unworthy as themselves. Those fortunes were indeed

built upon a rotten foundation, which the same system had power to raise

up and to overthrow:—

Quidam immolasset verrem quum sancto Herculi,

Cui pro salute votum debebat sua,

Asello jussit reliquias poni hordei.

Quas aspernatus ille sic locutus est:

Tuum libenter prorsus appeterem cibum

Nisi, qui nutritus illo est, jugulatus foret.

* * * * *

Majorem turbam punitorum reperies;

Paucis temeritas est bono, multis malo.[1019]

“A man who had sacrificed a boar to Hercules, which he had vowed as a

thank-offering for his recovery from sickness, ordered the remains of

the barley to be given to his ass. The ass rejected it with scorn, and

said, ‘I would gladly eat of the food you give me, had not he who was

fattened on it had his throat cut.’

“You will find that the majority of those who grow rich by violence and

rapine are punished; audacity succeeds with few, but ruins many.”

The continued succession of tyrannical emperors must have taught their

oppressed subjects that they had nothing to hope for from a change of

those who wore the purple. This truth is imbodied in the fable of the

old Peasant and his Ass:——

In principatu commutando civium

Nil, præter domini nomen, mutant pauperes.

Id esse verum parva hæc fabula indicat.

Asellum in prato timidus pascebat senex.

Is, hostium clamore subito territus,

Suadebat asino fugere, ne possent capi.

At ille lentus; quæso, num binas mihi

Clitellas impositurum victorem putas?

Senex negavit. Ergo quid refert mea

Cui serviam, clitellas dum portem meas?[1020]

“In a change of princes the poor change nothing but the name of their

master. The truth of this is shown by the following little fable. A

timid old man was feeding his ass in a meadow. Alarmed by the shouts of

an advancing enemy he urged the ass to fly for fear they should be taken

prisoners. But the ass loitered, and said, ‘Pray, do you think that the

conqueror will put two pack-saddles on my back?’ ‘No,’ replied the old

man. ‘What, then, does it matter to me in whose service I am, so long as

I have to carry my load?’”

The well known fable of the Wolf and the Lamb (i. 1) illustrates the

unscrupulousness of the informers; and that of the Wolf and the

House-dog (iii. 7) teaches how preferable is liberty, even under the

greatest privations, to luxury and comfort purchased by submission to

the caprices of a master.

Of such a kind were the moral and political lessons which Phædrus

enforced in the attractive garb of fables. They were of a general

character, suggested by the evils of the times in which he lived.

Another class were suggested by historical events: they were

nevertheless severe satirical strictures on individuals. Two may be

pointed out as examples which are evidently directed against Tiberius

and Sejanus. These are—The Frogs demanding a King, (i. 2;) and the Frogs

and the Sun, (i. 6.) Neither of the fables are original; they are

apposite applications of two by Æsop.

The Romans,[1021] like the frogs in the first of these fables, had

exchanged their liberty for the slavery of the empire. In Tiberius, now

an imbecile dotard, wholly given up to sensual indulgence in his retreat

at Capreæ, they had a perfect King Log. He was utterly careless of the

sufferings of his subjects and the administration of his kingdom.

To his odious minister, Sejanus, he intrusted the toils of government,

to which his own indolence indisposed him. All tyranny and cruelty were

ascribed to the ministers; whilst the effeminate debauchery of the

Emperor rendered him, even in that demoralized age, an object of

contempt and insult rather than of abhorrence and fear. L. Sejanus, a

kinsman of Ælius,[1022] employed bald-headed persons, and children with

their heads shaved, in the procession of the Floral games, in order to

hold up to scorn and derision the bald-headed Emperor, and he dared not

take notice of the insult. The infamous Fulcinius Trio in his last will

declared that Tiberius had become childish in his old age, and that his

continued retirement was nothing else but exile.[1023] Pacuvianus was

the author of pasquinades against the Emperor. In the same way Phædrus

describes the frogs as treating “King Log” with scorn, and as defiling

him in the most offensive manner.

But after the death of Sejanus a change took place in the Emperor’s

conduct, though not in his character. He left Capreæ for a time, and

took up his abode in the Vatican, close to the very walls of Rome. He

now gave vent to his savage disposition, and displayed the temper of the

water-snake in the fable. His natural cruelty was equalled by his

activity. “His sharp tooth seized his unresisting victims one after the

other: in vain they fly from death; fear prevents them from uttering a

word in defence or expostulation.” No longer a vast expanse of sea and

land intervened between the tyrant and his victims. There was nothing to

delay the pompous and verbose missives of his bloody purposes: his

rescripts could reach the consuls the same day, or at least after the

interval of a night: he could behold, as it were, with his own eyes, the

reeking hands of the executioners, and the waves of blood which deluged

every dwelling.[1024] Vengeance not only fell on the guilty Sejanus and

his unoffending family, the vilest and the noblest blood of Rome alike

flowed at the tyrant’s command. The fable of the Frogs and the Sun was a

covert attack upon the ambitious designs of Sejanus. It is sufficiently

short to be quoted:

Uxorem quandam Sol quum vellet ducere,

Clamorem Ranæ sustulere ad sidera.

Convicio permotus, quærit Jupiter

Causam querelæ. Quædam tum stagni incola,

Nunc, inquit, omnes unus exurit lacus

Cogitque miseras arida sede emori;

Quidnam futurum est, si creârit liberos?[1025]

“Once upon a time the Sun determined to marry; and the Frogs raised a

cry of alarm to Heaven. Jupiter, moved by their complaints, asked the

cause of them. One of the denizens of the pond answered:—‘Now the Sun by

himself dries up all the lakes, and causes us to die a miserable death

in our parched-up dwellings. What then will become of us if he has

children?’”

Now let us examine the application. The fawning yet ambitious Sejanus

had always aspired to ally himself with the imperial family. The first

attempt which he made to accomplish his design was procuring the

betrothal of his daughter to Drusus, the son of Claudius, afterwards

emperor. This prince died young, and consequently the marriage never

took place;[1026] but this first opened the eyes of the Romans to the

audacious projects of the favourite. Later in his career,[1027] he, by a

similar step, endeavoured to pave his way to the imperial purple. He

seduced Livilla, the sister of the amiable Germanicus, poisoned her

husband, divorced his own wife, and asked the sanction of Tiberius to

his marriage with the widow of the murdered man. The emperor, with his

usual finesse and dissimulation, refused. The demand awoke the

suspicions of the court, and was a commencement of that coolness between

Sejanus and his patron which eventually ended in the fall of the latter.

The influence of Sejanus alone was sufficiently baneful; what would it

be if multiplied by a race of princes descended from him? The mere

probability of such an event naturally filled Rome with alarm and

consternation; and this Phædrus endeavoured to encourage by a fable,

which, if it had not some such object as this, would scarcely be

intelligible.

The quotations which have been given from the fables of Phædrus are

sufficient, as examples of his ingenuity in imitation and adaptation, as

well as of his original genius, whenever he trusts to his powers of

invention. Some of his pieces, although, like the rest, they are

entitled fables, are, in fact, narratives of real events, and show that

he possessed a charming talent for telling anecdotes, besides skill as a

fabulist in the proper sense of the term. His style has great merits: it

combines the simple neatness and graceful elegance of the golden age

with the vigour and terseness of the silver one. Phædrus has the

facility of Ovid, and the brevity of Tacitus. Thus standing in the epoch

between two literary periods, he, as far as the humble nature of his

walk admits, unites the excellencies of both. Between the age of Horace

and Juvenal, Cicero and Tacitus, there was a gap, and a long one, not

less than half a century: it was a period in which Roman genius was

slumbering. Phædrus proves that that sleep was not the sleep of death.

Tacitus has partially accounted for this cold and dark interval. He

tells us[1028]—“that although the affairs of the ancient Roman republic,

whether in prosperity or in adversity, were related by illustrious

writers—and even the times of Augustus were not deficient in historians

of talent and genius—nevertheless the gradual growth of a spirit of

adulation deterred all who were qualified for the task from attempting

it. Fear, during the lifetime of Tiberius, Caius, Claudius, and Nero,

and hatred, still fresh after their deaths, rendered all accounts of

their reigns false.”

It was thus, according to him, fear and hatred, and a spirit of

flattery, that silenced the voice of history. Doubtless what he says of

history applies with equal force to poetry, and oratory likewise. The

same cause which crushed political liberty rendered the truthfulness of

the historian fraught with danger, and all poetry, except it spoke the

language of adulation, treason; a crime which was no longer one against

the majesty of the people, but was transferred to the person of the

emperor. The very term παρρησια (boldness of speech) was a word, the

utterance of which was as perilous as to speak of liberty.[1029] The

danger had scarcely passed away when Juvenal, notwithstanding his

fearless spirit, wrote:—

Unde illa priorum

Scribendi quodcunque animo flagrante liberet,

Simplicitas, cujus non audeo dicere nomen.

_Juv._ i. 153.

Where the plain times, the simple, when our sires

Enjoyed a freedom which I dare not name,

And gave the public sin to public shame,

Heedless who smiled or frowned.

_Gifford._

But there was a negative as well as a positive cause, the withdrawal of

patronage. Literature, in order to flourish, requires the genial

sunshine of human sympathy: it needs either the patronage of the great

or the favour of the people. In Greece it enjoyed the latter in the

highest possible degree; in Rome, from the time of the Scipios to that

of Augustus, it was fostered by the former. Immediately after his death

patronage was withdrawn, and there was not public support to supply its

place. Tiberius was first a soldier; then a dark and reserved

politician; lastly, a blood-thirsty and superstitious sensualist. The

enjoyments of Gaius Caligula were the extravagancies of a madman,

although he was responsible for his moral insanity, because he had, by

vicious indulgence, been the destroyer of his moral principle; and not

only did he not encourage literature, but he even hated Homer and

Virgil. Lastly, the stupid and dozing Claudius wrote books[1030] as

stupid as himself, and was at once the butt and tool of his courtiers.

It was not, therefore, until the reign of Nero that literature revived;

for, though the bloodiest of tyrants, he had an ambition to excel in

refinement, and had a taste for art and poetry.

In the construction of his fables, Phædrus displays observation and

ingenuity. Nothing escapes his watchful eye which can be turned to

account in his little poems. A rude sketch in charcoal on the wall of a

low tavern[1031] suggested to him the idea of the Battle between the

Rats and the Weasels. His animals are grouped, and put in attitudes,

just as a painter would arrange them. His accurate eye has noted and

registered the habits of the brute creation, and he has adapted them to

the delivery of noble and wise sentiments with the utmost ingenuity. But

there his genius stops. He is deficient in imagination. He makes his

animals the vehicles of his wisdom; but he does not throw himself into

them, or identify himself with them. The true poet is lost in his

characters: carried away by the enthusiasm of an inspired imagination,

his spirit is transfused into his heroes;—you forget his existence. The

characters of Phædrus look and act like animals, but talk like human

beings: the moralist and the philosopher can always be detected speaking

under their mask and in their disguise.

In this consists the great superiority of Æsop to his Roman imitator.

His brutes are a superior race, but they are still brutes. The reader

could almost fancy that the fabulist had lived amongst them as one of

themselves—had adopted their modes of life, and had conversed with them

in their own language. In Phædrus we have human sentiments translated

into the language of beasts—in Æsop we have beasts giving utterance to

such sentiments as would be naturally theirs, if they were placed in the

position of men. Skilful adaptation and happy delineation are the

triumphs of ingenuity and observation: the creative power is that of the

imagination.

The style of Phædrus, notwithstanding a few provincialisms,[1032] is

pure and classical. He does not often indulge in the use of metaphors,

but the few which are met with are striking and appropriate. He is not

entirely free from some of that far-fetched affectation which

characterizes the decline of Roman literature. But his fault is

exaggerated conciseness, and the concentration of many ideas within a

brief space, rather than the rhetorical ornament which now began to be

admired and popular. His endeavour after brevity led him to use abstract

substantives far more profusely than is consistent with the practice of

the best classical writers. These faults, however, do not interfere with

that clearness and simplicity, which, quite as much as the subjects,

have rendered the fables of Phædrus a popular book for the young

student, and please even those who have the opportunity of comparing his

iambics with the liveliness of Gay, the politeness of Florian, the

philosophy of Lessing, the sweetness of Cowper, and the unequalled

versatility of La Fontaine.

CHAPTER II.

DRAMATIC LITERATURE IN THE AUGUSTAN AGE—REVIVAL UNDER NERO—DEFECTS OF

THE TRAGEDIES ATTRIBUTED TO SENECA—INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF THEIR

AUTHORSHIP—SENECA THE PHILOSOPHER A STOIC—INCONSISTENT AND UNSTABLE—THE

SENTIMENTS OF HIS PHILOSOPHICAL WORKS FOUND IN HIS TRAGEDIES—PARALLEL

PASSAGES COMPARED—FRENCH SCHOOL OF TRAGIC POETS.

Of Roman tragedy in its earliest period, so far as the fragments of it

which remain allow a judgment to be formed, an account has already been

given; and if circumstances forbade it to flourish then, still less can

it be expected that the boldness and independence of Greek tragedy would

be found under the empire.

Nevertheless, there were not wanting some imitators of Greece in this

noblest branch of Greek poetry, however unsuitable it was to the genius

of the Roman people, and unlikely to be appreciated by them.

But their productions were rather literary than dramatic; they were

intended to be read, not acted. They were poems composed in a dramatic

form, because Athens had set the example of that form to her devoted

imitators. Although, therefore, they contain noble philosophical

sentiments, lively descriptions, vigorous conceptions and delineations

of character, and passages full of tenderness and pathos, they are

deficient in dramatic effect, and positively offend against those laws

of good taste, which, not arbitrarily assumed, but founded on the

principles of the human mind, regulated the Athenian stage.

We have seen that, in the Augustan age, a few writers attained some

excellence in tragedy, at least in the opinion of ancient critics.

Besides Ovid and Varius, whose tragedies have been already mentioned,

Asinius Pollio acquired a high reputation as a tragic poet, and

Virgil[1033] declares that he is the only one worthy of being compared

with Sophocles:—

Sola Sophocleo tua carmina digna cothurno.

On the revival of letters under that professor of a love of

poetry,[1034] the tyrant Nero, dramatic literature reappeared, and

perfect specimens are extant in the ten tragedies attributed to Seneca.

Various and opposite opinions have been entertained respecting their

merits; but there can be no doubt that the genius of the author never

can grasp in their wholeness the characters which he attempts to copy;

they are distorted images of the Greek originals; the awful and shadowy

grandeur of the god-like heroes of Æschylus stand forth in corporeal

vastness, and appear childish and unnatural, like the giants of a

story-book. The marvels of Greek tragedy and Greek mythology, though

merely the unreal conceptions of the imagination, do not appear

exaggerated, because the connexion between the theory and the result,

the causes and the effects, is so skilfully maintained; but in these

Roman tragedies the legends of Greece appear extravagant and absurd:

they are as unreal, and therefore seem as affected, as the classical

garb in which English poetry was arrayed in the age of Anne. The Greeks

believed in the gods and heroes whose agency and exploits constituted

the machinery of tragedy—the Romans did not; and thus we cannot

sympathize with them, because we see that they are insincere. The style,

moreover, of the tragedies, which bear the name of Seneca, is spoiled by

that inflated language and redundancy of ornament, the constant effect

of which is, as Aristotle observes, frigidity. They bear the visible

marks of an age in which genius had given place to an artificial and

scholastic rhetoric; and the author seems to have been striving not for

tragic pathos so much as brilliant declamation. In the female

characters, especially, the Roman tragic poet fails; for, although he

can understand heroism, he is unable to accomplish that most difficult

of all tasks, the combining it with feminine delicacy. Perhaps the best

and noblest of his country-women did not furnish him with such ideals.

The Roman matron was the counterpart of her warlike lord. The Lucretias,

Porcias, Cornelias, Arrias, though devoted and affectionate, were of

sterner mould than Antigone and Deianira.

The tragedies which bear the name of Seneca have been attributed to L.

Annæus Seneca, the philosopher, as early as the time of

Quintilian,[1035] who quotes as Seneca’s a verse from the Medea. The

improbability of this being the case is also diminished by the fact that

both Tacitus[1036] and Pliny the younger[1037] speak of him as a poet.

Nevertheless, their authorship has been considered a very doubtful

question. A passage in an epigram of Martial, in which he speaks of

Cordova as the birthplace of two Senecas and one Lucan—

Duosque Senecas unicumque Lucanum

Facunda loquitur Corduba[1038]—

has been interpreted as implying that Seneca the philosopher was a

different person from Seneca the tragedian. There can, however, be

scarcely any doubt that he was speaking of M. Annæus Seneca the

rhetorician, and his son Lucius the philosopher. Sidonius

Apollinaris,[1039] the son-in-law of the Emperor Flavius Avitus, and

Bishop of Clermont,[1040] in the last years of the Roman empire,

unhesitatingly draws a distinction between them. He enumerates three

members of the Cordovan family:—

Quorum unus colit hispidum Platonem,

Incassumque suum monet Neronem,

Orchestram quatit alter Euripidis

Pictum fæcibus Æschylum sequutus,

Aut plaustris solitum sonare Thespim

Pugnam tertius ille Gallicanam

Dixit Cæsaris.

_Carm._ ix. 231.

But, notwithstanding the celebrity which Sidonius enjoyed as a poet at

the imperial court, his opinion is of no authority when weighed against

the internal evidence derived from the tragedies themselves. This

renders it almost morally certain, that they are the work of no other

writer than Seneca the philosopher.

Although the Romans, as being imitators of the Greeks, and not original

thinkers, were eclectics in philosophy, their favourite doctrines were

those of the Stoics. They suited the rigid sternness of their character:

they imbodied that spirit of self-devotion and self-denial with which

the Roman patriot, in the old times of simple republican virtue, threw

himself into his public duties; and Seneca, with all his faults, was a

real Roman: with all his finesse and artful policy, he retained, in the

midst of a debased age and a profligate court, a large portion of the

old Roman character. In life and in death his was a true specimen of the

Stoic creed.

Still he was by no means a consistent man: his theory was perfect, but

his practice often fell short of it. The lessons of morality contained

in his philosophical works are excellent, and persuasively enforced, and

wear an appearance of honesty and sincerity; but, nevertheless, in his

philosophy, as well as in his life, we can discover that his moral

principles were unstable and wavering. These two features can be traced

in his tragedies: they abound in philosophical dogmas and moral

sentiments, and they display the same Stoicism mingled with occasional

habits of inconsistency. Suicide is painted in the most attractive

colours: death is met not only with courage, but with the same

indifference with which Seneca himself, together with other victims of

imperial tyranny, met it in his own day. It is not welcomed, as in the

Greek tragedians, as a relief from the burden of earthly sorrows; but

there is a manifest departure from the Greek model: the natural beauty

of that model is violated, and the features of the original character

sacrificed to Stoical coldness and want of feeling.

But not only are these tragedies filled with philosophical reflections;

even the sentiments enunciated in the acknowledged works of Seneca, in

his Essays and Epistles, are transferred to them, and the peculiar turns

of expression used by the philosopher are repeated by the poet. A

brilliant French author[1041] has ingeniously brought together and

compared parallel passages, which illustrate this similarity of

sentiment and style. A few of these are sufficient as examples. Two in

the “Phœnissæ,” in which Œdipus insists on “the liberty of dying,”

imbody the same doctrine as two others, one in the epistles to Lucilius,

the other in the treatise on Providence.

He (says Œdipus) who compels one who is unwilling to die does the same

as he who hinders one who is eager for death; nay, I consider the

latter treats me the worse of the two. I had rather that death were

forced upon me than that the privilege of dying should be torn from

me.

Qui cogit mori

Nolentem, in æquo est, quique properantem impedit.

Nec tamen in æquo est; alterum gravius reor,

Malo imperari quam eripi mortem mihi.

_Phœnis._ 98.

And again the same favourite sentiment appears:—

I cannot be prevented from dying; of what availeth all that care of

thine? Death is everywhere. Most wisely has God provided for this.

There is no one who cannot rob a man of life, but no one can rob him

of death; to this a thousand roads are open.

Morte prohiberi haud queo.

Quid ista tandem cura proficit tua?

Ubique mors est. Optime hoc _cavit_ Deus.

Eripere vitam nemo non homini potest;

_At nemo mortem_; mille ad hanc aditus _patent_.

_Phœnis._ 146.

With these are compared the following sentences of the philosopher, in

which not only the doctrines, but also the language in which they are

expressed, are so strikingly parallel as scarcely to admit of a doubt

that the authors are identical:—

To live under compulsion is an evil; but there is no compulsion to

live under compulsion. Many roads to liberty lie open on all sides,

short and easy. Let us thank God that no one can be retained in life.

And, again, Divine Providence is represented as declaring to mankind:—

Before all things I have provided that no one should detain you

against your will—an exit is open to you.

Malum est in necessitate vivere, sed in necessitate vivere necessitas

nulla est. _Patent_ undique ad libertatem _viæ multæ_, breves,

faciles. Agamus Deo gratias, quod nemo in vitâ teneri potest.—Ep. xii.

Ante omnia _cavi_, ne quis vos teneret invitos, patet exitus.

_De Provident._ vi.

How exactly in accordance with these sentiments, whether expressed in

poetry or prose, is the closing scene of Seneca’s life; the almost

business-like way in which he entered upon the road which was appointed

to lead him from the dominion of necessity to the enjoyment of

liberty—the imperturbable coolness with which he could contemplate the

death of his wife, whom he loved with the greatest affection![1042] How

calculated, moreover, were they to engage the sympathies of his

contemporaries! It was an age in which, amidst its various corruptions,

the only virtue which survived was the knowing how to meet death with a

courageous spirit, in which many of the best and the noblest willingly

died by their own hands at the imperial mandate, in order to save their

name from infamy, and the inheritance of their children from

confiscation.

Again, an awful belief in destiny, and the hopeless, yet patient,

struggle of a great and good man against this all-ruling power, is the

mainspring of Greek tragedy. This is not transferred into the imitations

of the Romans. Its place is supplied by the stern fatalism of the

Stoics. The principle of destiny entertained by the Greek poets is a

mythological, even a religious one: it is the irresistible will of God.

God is at the commencement of the chain of causes and effects by which

the event is brought about which God has ordained; his inspired prophets

have power to foretell, and mortals cannot resist or avoid. It is rather

predestination than destiny. The doctrine implies an intelligent agent,

not a mere abstract principle.

The fatalism of the Stoics, on the other hand, is the doctrine of

practical necessity. It ignores the almighty power of the Supreme Being,

although it does not deny his existence. It strips him of his attributes

as the moral Governor of the universe. These doctrines are found both in

the philosopher and tragic poet. Translate the subjoined prose passage

into the conventional language of poetry, adopt as a mere matter of

embellishment the fables of Greek mythology, personify the Stoical

principle of necessity by the Greek Fates, and it becomes the Chorus in

the Latin tragedy Œdipus. Both these passages are quoted by Nisard:—

_Nihil cogor nihil patior invitus_; nec servio Deo, sed assentior; eo

quidem magis, quod scio _omnia certa_ et in æternum dicta lege

decurrere. _Fata nos ducunt_, et quantum cuique restat, _prima

nascentium hora disposuit. Causa pendet ex causa_; privata ac publica

_longus ordo_ rerum trahit. Ideo fortiter omne ferendum est; quia non,

ut putamus, incidunt cuncta, sed veniunt. Olim constitutum est quid

gaudeas, quid fleas; et quamvis magna videatur varietate singulorum

vita distingui, summa in unum venit; accepimus peritura perituri.

_De Provid._ v.

I am neither compelled to do or to suffer anything against my will. I

am not a slave to God, but I bow to his will. The more so because I

know that all things are fixed and proceed according to an everlasting

law. Destiny is our guide, and the hour of our birth has disposed all

the remainder of our lives. Each cause depends upon a preceding one; a

long chain of circumstances links together all things, both public and

private. Therefore we must bear all things with fortitude, since all

things _come to pass_, and do not, as we suppose, _happen_. Our joys

or sorrows have been determined long ago; and although a great variety

of items distinguishes the lives of individuals, the sum total is the

same. Perishable creatures ourselves, that which we have received is

perishable likewise.

A comparison of the above with the following passage exhibits a

similarity which could only have proceeded from the same mind and the

same pen; for it is to be remembered, that though the Romans were

imitators of the Greeks, they did not copy one another; and throughout

the whole field of Roman literature no example could be found of a poet

transferring to his works the exact sentiments, tone of thought, and

turn of expression of another Latin author:—

_Fatis agimur, cedite fatis_:

Non sollicitæ possunt curæ

Mutare rati stamina fusi.

_Quicquid patimur_, mortale genus,

_Quicquid facimus_, venit ex alto;

Servatque suæ decreta colus

Lachesis, dura revoluta manu.

_Omnia certo tramite_ vadunt

_Primusque dies dedit extremum_.

Non illa Deo vertisse licet

_Quæ nexa suis currunt causis_.

It cuique ratus, prece non ulla

Mobilis, _ordo_.

_Œdip._ 980.

We are led by destiny—yield then to its power. Anxious care cannot

change the thread spun by the distaff of the Fates. Whatever we

mortals do or suffer comes from on high; and Lachesis observes the

decrees of the wheel which revolves beneath her pitiless hand. All

things proceed in a fixed path, and the first day of life has

determined the last. God has not power to change the chain of causes

and effects. Each has its fixed order, which no prayers can alter.

Even the philosophical inconsistencies[1043] traceable in the prose

treatises are repeated in the tragedies. In one letter[1044] he affirms

his belief that the soul of Scipio Africanus has ascended into heaven as

a reward of his virtue and piety; in another[1045] he asserts the gloomy

doctrine that death is annihilation: “Mors est non esse.” In like manner

in the “Troades” the Chorus declares that the happy Priam wanders

amongst pious souls in the “safe Elysian shades;”[1046] and yet, with an

inconsistency which the Letters of the philosopher alone account for,

another passage in the same tragedy declares that the spirit vanishes

like smoke, that after death is nothingness, and death itself is

nothing.[1047]

On such internal evidence as this rests the probability, almost

amounting to certainty, that Seneca the philosopher, and the author of

the ten tragedies, are one and the same.[1048]

Notwithstanding their false rhetorical taste, and the absence of all

ideal and creative genius, the tragedies of Seneca found many admirers

and imitators in modern times. The French school of tragic poets took

them for their model: Corneille evidently considered them the ideal of

tragedy, and Racine servilely imitated them. Their philosophy captivated

an age which thought that nothing was so sublime as heathen philosophy;

and yet that same age derived its notions of ancient philosophy from the

Romans instead of from the original Greek sources; and its poetical

taste, as far as it was classical, was formed on a study of Roman

dramatic literature, before the excellence of the Attic drama was

sufficiently known to be appreciated.

CHAPTER III.

BIOGRAPHY OF PERSIUS—HIS SCHOOLBOY DAYS—HIS FRIENDS—HIS PURITY AND

MODESTY—HIS DEFECTS AS A SATIRIST—SUBJECTS OF HIS SATIRES—OBSCURITY OF

HIS STYLE—COMPARED WITH HORACE—BIOGRAPHY OF JUVENAL—CORRUPTION OF ROMAN

MORALS—CRITICAL OBSERVATIONS OF THE SATIRES—THEIR HISTORICAL VALUE—STYLE

OF JUVENAL—HE WAS THE LAST OF ROMAN SATIRISTS.

AULUS PERSIUS FLACCUS (BORN A. D. 34.)

Roman satire subsequently to Horace is represented by Aulus Persius

Flaccus and Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Persius was a member of an

equestrian family, and was born, according to the Eusebian Chronicle,

A. D. 34, at Volaterræ in Etruria. He was related to the best families

in Italy, and numbered amongst his kindred Arria, the noble-minded wife

of Pætus. His father died when he was six years old, and his mother,

Fulvia Sisenna, married a second time a Roman knight named Fusius. In a

few years she was again a widow. Persius received his elementary

education at his native town; but at twelve years of age he was brought

to Rome, and went through the usual course of grammar and rhetoric,

under Remmius Palæmon[1049] and Virginius Flavus.[1050] The former of

these was, like so many men of letters, a freedman, and the son of a

slave. He was, according to Suetonius,[1051] a man of profligate morals,

but gifted with great fluency of speech, and a prodigious memory. He was

rather a versifier than a poet, and, like so many modern Italians,

possessed the talent of improvising. He was prosperous as a

schoolmaster, considering the very small pittance which the members of

that profession usually earned, for his school brought him in forty

sestertia per annum (about 325_l._[1052]) Virginius Flavus is only known

as the author of a treatise on Rhetoric.

Persius himself gives[1053] an amusing picture of his schoolboy

idleness, his love of play, and his tricks to escape the hated

declamation which, in Roman schools, formed a weekly exercise:[1054]—

Sæpe oculos, memini, tangebam parvus olivo,

Grandia si nollem morituri verba Catonis

Discere non sano multum laudanda magistro,

Quæ pater adductis sudans audiret amicis.

Jure; etenim id summum, quid dexter senio ferret,

Scire erat in voto; damnosa canicula quantum

Raderet; angustæ collo non fallier orcæ;

Neu quis callidior buxum torquere flagello.

Oft, I remember yet, my sight to spoil,

Oft, when a boy, I bleared my eyes with oil:

What time I wished my studies to decline,

Nor make great Cato’s dying speeches mine;

Speeches my master to the skies had raised,

Poor pedagogue! unknowing what he praised;

And which my sire, suspense ’twixt hope and fear,

With venial pride, had brought his friends to hear.

For then, alas! ’twas my supreme delight

To study chances, and compute aright

What sum the lucky dice would yield in play,

And what the fatal aces sweep away;

Anxious no rival candidate for fame

Should hit the long-necked jar with nicer aim;

Nor, while the whirling top beguiled the eye,

With happier skill the sounding scourge apply.

_Gifford._

At sixteen, Persius attached himself to the Stoic philosopher Annæus

Cornutus, by whom he was imbued with the stern philosophical principles

which occupy so prominent a place in his Satires. The friendship which

he formed thus early in life continued until the day of his death. The

young Lucan was also one of his intimate associates, whose philosophical

and poetical tastes were similar to his own, and who had a profound

admiration for his writings. He was acquainted with Seneca, but had no

very great regard either for him or his works. Cæsius Bassus, to whom he

addressed his sixth Satire, was also one of his intimates.[1055] It

redounds greatly to his honour that he enjoyed the friendship of Pætus

Thrasea, one of the noblest examples of Roman virtue.[1056] Persius died

prematurely of a disease in the stomach, at the age of twenty-eight. He

left a large fortune to his mother and sister; and his library,

consisting of seven hundred volumes, together with a considerable

pecuniary legacy, to his beloved tutor, Cornutus. The philosopher,

however, disinterestedly gave up the money to the sister of his deceased

friend.

Pure in mind and chaste in life, Persius was free from the corrupt taint

of an immoral age. He exhibited all the self-denial, the control of the

passions, and the stern uncompromising principles of the philosophy

which he admired, but not its hypocrisy. Stoicism was not, in his case,

as in that of so many others, a cloak for vice and profligacy.

Although Lucretius was, to a certain extent, his model, he does not

attack vice with the biting severity of the old satirist. He rather

adopts the caustic irony of the old Greek comedy, as more in accordance

with that style of attack which he himself terms—

petulanti splene cachinno.[1057]

Nor do we find in his writings the fiery ardour, the enthusiastic

indignation, which burn in the verses of Juvenal; but this resulted from

the tenderness of his heart and the gentleness of his disposition, and

not from any disqualification for the duties of a moral instructor, such

as weak moral principle, or irresolute timidity.

Although he must have been conscious that the dangerous times during

which his short life was passed rendered caution necessary, still it is

far more probable that his purity of mind and kindliness of heart

disinclined him to portray vice in its hideous and loathsome forms, and

to indulge in bitterness of invective which prevalent enormities of his

times deserved. It may be questioned whether obscenities like those of

Juvenal, notwithstanding purity of intention, best promote the interests

of virtue. It is to be feared that often the passions are excited and

the human heart rendered more corrupt by descriptions of vice, whilst

the moral lesson is disregarded.

Persius evidently believed that reserve and silence, or those

abominations which make the pure-minded shudder with horror, and call up

a blush upon the cheek of innocence, would more safely maintain the

dignity and purity of virtue, than the divesting himself of that virgin

modesty (_virgineus ille pudor_) which constituted the great charm of

his character. His uprightness and love of virtue are shown by the

uncompromising severity with which he rebukes sins of not so deep a die;

and the heart which was capable of being moulded by his example, and

influenced by his purity, would have shrunk from the fearful crimes

which defile the pages of Juvenal.

The greatest defect in Persius, as a satirist, is, that the philosophy

in which he was educated rendered him too indifferent to the affairs

which were going on in the world around him. Politics had little

interest for him: he lived within himself a meditative life; wealth and

splendour he despised. His contemplative habits led him to criticise, as

his favourite subjects, false taste in poetry and empty pretensions to

philosophy. His modest and retiring nature found little sympathy with

the passions, the tumults, the business, or the pleasures which agitated

Rome. He was more a student of the closet than a man of the world.

Horace mingled in the society of the profligate; he considered them as

fools; and laughed their folly to scorn. Juvenal looked down upon the

corruption of the age from an eminence, where, involved in his virtue,

he was safe from moral pollution, and punished it like an avenging

deity. Persius, pure in heart and passionless by education, whilst he

lashes wickedness in the abstract, almost ignores its existence, and

modestly shrinks from laying bare the secret pollutions of the human

heart, and from probing its vileness to the bottom. The amiability, and

above all the disinterestedness, which characterize his Satires, fully

account for the popularity which they attained immediately on their

publication by Cornutus, and the panegyrics of which he was the subject

in later times. “Persius,” writes Quintilian,[1058] “multum et veræ

gloriæ, quamvis uno libro meruit.” Many of the early Christian writers

thought that his merits fully compensated for the obscurity of his

style; and Gifford[1059] observes, “The virtue he recommends he

practised in the fullest extent; and, at an age when few have acquired a

determinate character, he left behind him an established reputation for

genius, learning, and worth.”

The works of Persius are comprised within the compass of six Satires,

containing, in all, about 650 lines. And from the expression of

Quintilian, already cited, and supported by a passage of Martial, there

is reason to suppose that all he wrote is now extant. To his Satires is

prefixed a short but spirited introduction in choliambics, _i. e._ lame

iambics, in which, for the iambus in the sixth place, there is

substituted a spondee.

This proëmium bears but little relation to his work; but he was

accustomed to similar irrelevancy in the parabases of the old Attic

comedy, which he had studied. In his first Satire he exposes and

accounts for the false and immoral taste which affected poetry and

forensic eloquence, attacks the coxcombry of public recitation, and

parodies the style of contemporary writers, in language which our

ignorance of them prevents us from appreciating. In the second, which is

a congratulatory address to his dear friend Macrinus on his birthday, he

imbodies the subject-matter of the second Alcibiades of Plato;[1060] a

dialogue which Juvenal also had in view in the composition of his tenth

Satire. In this poem, the degrading ideas which men have formed

respecting the Deity, the consequent selfishness and even impiety of

their prayers, are followed by sentiments on the true nature of prayer,

which even a Christian can read with admiration:—

Quin damus id superis, de magna quod dare lance

Non possit magni Messalæ lippa propago;

Compositum jus fasque animo sanctosque recessus

Mentis et incoctum generoso pectus honesto:

Hæc cedo, ut admoveam templis, et farre litabo.[1061]

No, let me bring the immortals what the race

Of great Messala, now depraved and base,

On their huge charger cannot,—bring a mind

Where legal and where moral sense are joined

With the pure essence; holy thoughts that dwell

In the soul’s most retired and sacred cell;

A bosom dyed in honour’s noblest grain—

Deep-dyed;—with these let me approach the fane,

And Heaven will hear the humble prayer I make,

Though all my offering be a barley-cake.

In the third, he endeavours to shame the ingenuous youth out of an idle

aversion to the pursuit of wisdom, and contrasts the enjoyments of a

well-regulated mind with ignorance and sensuality: the picture which he

draws of the fate of the sensualist is very powerful:—

Turgidus hic epulis atque albo ventre lavatur,

Gutture sulfureas lente exhalante mephites;

Sed tremor inter vina subit, calidumque trientem

Excutit e manibus; dentes crepuere retecti;

Uncta cadunt laxis tunc pulmentaria labris.

Hinc tuba, candelæ; tandemque beatulus, alto

Compositus lecto, crassisque lutatus amomis,

In portam rigidos calces extendit; at illum

Hesterni capite induto subiere Quirites.[1062]

Now to the bath, full gorged with luscious fare,

See the pale wretch his bloated carcass bear;

While from his lungs, that faintly play by fits,

His gasping throat sulphureous steam emits!

Cold shiverings seize him, as for wine he calls,

His grasp betrays him, and the goblet falls!

From his loose teeth the lip, convulsed, withdraws,

And the rich cates drop through his listless jaws.

Then trumpets, torches come, in solemn state;

And my fine youth, so confident of late,

Stretched on a splendid bier and essenced o’er,

Lies, a stiff corpse, heels foremost at the door;

Romans of yesterday, with covered head,

Shoulder him to the pyre, and—all is said. _Gifford._

One more quotation must be made from this noble Satire, which is alluded

to by St. Augustine,[1063] and in which Persius enunciates the sublime

truth, that the most fearful punishment which can befall the profligate

is the consciousness of what they have lost in rejecting virtue:—

Magne pater divûm, sævos punire tyrannos

Haud alia ratione velis, quum dira libido

Moverit ingenium ferventi tincta veneno;

Virtutem videant intabescantque relicta![1064]

Dread sire of gods! when lust’s envenomed stings

Stir the fierce natures of tyrannic kings—

When storms of rage within their bosoms roll,

And call in thunder for thy just control—

O, then relax the bolt, suspend the blow,

And thus, and thus alone, thy vengeance show.

In all her charms, set Virtue in their eye,

And let them see their loss, despair, and—die. _Gifford._

In the fourth Satire, Nero is represented in the character of

Alcibiades; and Plato’s first Dialogue, which bears the name of the

Athenian Libertine, furnished the foundation and many of the sentiments.

The fifth is the most elaborate of all the poet’s works. It is addressed

to Cornutus, and is in the form of a dialogue between the philosopher

and his pupil. The style is more finished than usual, and more adorned

with the graces of poetry; his amiable nature beams forth in all the

warmth of a grateful heart; and although he does not display any

original philosophical research, he exhibits great learning, and an

accurate acquaintance with the Stoic philosophy.

If the fifth Satire is the most elaborate, the sixth is, without doubt,

the most delightful of the works of Persius. It is addressed to his dear

friend Cæsius Bassus, and overflows with kindness of heart. The poet

speaks of the duties of contentment, and of ministering to the

distresses of others; the hatefulness of envy; the meanness of avarice,

beneath whatever disguise it may be veiled; his own determination to use

and not abuse his fortune; whilst there may be traced through the whole

a foreboding, yet a cheerful one, that his weary course will soon be

run, and that his heir will soon succeed to his possessions.[1065]

Such was the character of Persius as mirrored in his little volume. The

gloomy sullenness of Stoicism was not able to destroy the natural

amiability and placid cheerfulness of his temper. Its darkness affected

his style, but not his disposition. The fault which has been universally

found with the style of Persius, is difficulty and obscurity. This would

be the natural consequence of his Stoical education. The Stoics were

proverbially obscure and dark in their teaching; and Persius, who had

not imbibed all the profoundness of their philosophy, had still caught

their language and their manner of expression, and whilst he was

infected by their faults he acquired also their picturesqueness and

liveliness of illustration. Nor does it appear that his style was

considered obscure enough by his contemporaries to interfere with its

popularity. It is probable that his obscurity is not absolute, but only

relative to the knowledge of the language possessed in modern times. His

was the conversational Latin of the days in which he lived; and as a

great change had taken place from the Latin of Cicero and Livy to that

of Tacitus and Seneca, doubtless the conversational Latin of Horace, and

even of Juvenal, would differ from that of Persius. If this be the case,

the Satires of Persius constitute the only example of this Latin, and we

have no other by a comparison of which we can explain and illustrate his

modes of expression. Whatever, therefore, is unusual becomes at once a

source of difficulty and obscurity.[1066] The short description which

Persius represents his preceptor as giving of his style, supports this

assertion:—

Verba togæ sequeris junctura callidus acri

Ac teres modico, pallentes radere mores

Doctus et ingenuo culpam defigere ludo.[1067]

Confined to common life, thy numbers flow,

And neither soar too high, nor sink too low;

There strength and ease in graceful union meet,

Though polished, subtle, and though poignant, sweet;

Yet powerful to abash the front of crime,

And crimson error’s cheek with sportive rhyme.

_Gifford._

As the _toga_ had, since the time of Augustus, been only worn by the

higher orders, whilst the common people were content with the _tunica_,

it is clear that the words _verba togæ_ signify the language of polished

society. One cause, therefore, of the difficulty of the style of Persius

may be our want of familiarity with the conversational Latin used in his

time by the superior classes. Excessive subtlety may have been mistaken

for refinement; and an affectation of philosophy, and an enigmatical

style, may cause obscurity to us which was quite intelligible to his

contemporaries.

It is evident that Persius had carefully studied, and was quite well

acquainted with, the Satires of Horace; but the influence which Horace

produced upon his mind went no further than to impress upon his memory

certain phrases which he reproduced in a more perplexed form, more in

unison with the fashionable Latin of his day. The expression of Horace—

—— naso suspendis _adunco_

Ignotos,[1068]

becomes, in the Satires of Persius—

_Excusso_ populum suspendere naso.[1069]

Si vis me flere, dolendum est

Primum ipse tibi ——,[1070]

becomes, when paraphrased by his imitator—

Plorabit qui me volet incurvasse querela.[1071]

The simplicity of Horace in the words—

Totus teres atque rotundus

Externi ne quid valeat per læve morari,[1072]

is exchanged for the more involved phrase—

Ut per læve severos

Effundat junctura ungues.[1073]

He adopts Horace’s wish,[1074] preserving every idea in the passage—

—— O si

Sub rastro crepet argenti mihi seria dextro

Herculæ.[1075]

Horace’s acquirements in geometry—

Scilicet ut possem curvo dignoscere rectum,[1076]

are thus awkwardly rendered—

—— rectum discernis, ubi inter

Curva subit.[1077]

And, not to multiply examples which, whilst they show that Persius was

an admirer of Horace, prove that what was pure, natural inspiration in

the latter, required effort in the former. The idea of Horace—

Clamant periisse _pudorem_

Cuncti pene patres,[1078]

is exchanged by Persius for the forced metaphor——

Exclamet Melicerta perisse

_Frontem_ de rebus.[1079]

Rhetorical affectation infected all the literature of this age; we can

scarcely, therefore, be surprised to find that it is one of the

characteristics of the Satires of Persius. The age of public recitation

had already begun, of which Juvenal speaks some years later. When in one

place he describes the ardour and enthusiasm which pervaded Rome, on the

announcement of a new work by a popular author[1080]—

Curritur ad vocem jucundam et carmen amicæ

Thebaidos lætam fecit cum Statius urbem

Promisitque diem!

When Statius fixed a morning to recite

His Thebaid to the town with what delight

They flocked to him!

In another,[1081] like Horace, he complains of the annoyance of these

recitations; and in a third,[1082] he considers it one of the causes

which rendered the most desolate and solitary country-place preferable

to Rome.

The style of writing, therefore, suitable to this practice, was a

declamatory one, as the practice itself was in accordance with the

oratorical tastes of the Roman people.

JUVENAL.

Decimus Junius Juvenalis, according to the few lines of biography

generally attributed to Suetonius, was the son, or the adopted son, of a

wealthy freedman. He amused himself with rhetoric and declamation until

middle life; but having, on one occasion, written a short satire upon

Paris, the pantomime, he was tempted to apply himself to this species of

writing. After some time he recited his piece with such success to a

large audience, that he inserted it in one of his later

compositions.[1083] He thus exposed himself to the enmity of the court,

because his lines were supposed figuratively to apply to an actor who

was a court favourite, and he was exiled to Egypt, under pretence of

being appointed to the command of a cohort. There in a short time he

died of grief at the age of eighty.

The time of his birth is unknown, but he must have flourished in the

reign of Domitian, towards the close of the first century after Christ;

and it is generally assumed that he was either born, or resided, at the

Volscian town which subsequently gave birth to the eminent schoolman,

Thomas Aquinas.[1084] Thus the greater portion of the life of Juvenal

was passed during a period of political horror and misery. The short

reign of Vespasian was doubtless a blessing to Rome, but it was only a

brief temporary respite: the dark period of the last ten Cæsars saw the

utter moral degradation of the people, and the bloodiest tyranny and

oppression on the part of their rulers. If, which is most probable, he

lived to see the reigns of Nerva, Trajan, and Hadrian, the spirits of

the noble-minded satirist must have revived at seeing again a promise of

national glory and prosperity. In the period gone by, rich as it was in

material for his pen, it was fatally perilous to give utterance to his

burning indignation; but an opportunity, not to be lost, was then

offered when emperors ruled, who were distinguished for ability and

virtue, when justice and the laws were constitutionally administered,

and the empire, wisely governed, enjoyed security and tranquillity.

The picture of Roman manners, as painted by the glowing pencil of

Juvenal, is truly appalling. The fabric of society was in ruins. The

popular religion was rejected with scorn, and its place was not occupied

even by the creed of natural religion. Nothing remained but the empty

pomp, pageant and ceremonial. The administration of the state was a mass

of corruption: freedmen and foreigners, full of artful cunning, but

destitute of principle, had the ear of the sovereign, and filled their

coffers with bribes and confiscation. The grave and decent reserve which

was characteristic of every Roman, in olden times, was thrown off even

by the higher classes; and emperors took a public part in scenes of

folly and profligacy, and exposed themselves as charioteers, as dancers,

and as actors. Nothing was respected but wealth—nothing provoked

contempt but poverty.[1085] A vote was only valued for its worth in

money; that people, whose power was once absolute, would now sell their

souls for bread and the Circensian games.

Players and dancers had all honours and offices at their disposal. The

city swarmed with informers who made the rich their prey: every man

feared even his most intimate friend. To be noble, virtuous, innocent,

was no protection: the only bond of friendship was to be an accomplice

in crime. Philosophy was a cheat, and moral teaching an hypocrisy. The

moralists “preached like Curii, but lived like bacchanals.”[1086] The

very teacher would do his best to corrupt his pupil: the guardian would

defraud his ward. Luxury and extravagance brought men to ruin, which

they sought to repair by flattering the childless, legacy-hunting, and

gambling; and even patricians would cringe for a morsel of bread. The

higher classes were selfish and cruel, grinding and insolent to their

inferiors and dependants.[1087] Gluttony was so disgusting that six

thousand sesterces (50_l._) would be given for a mullet; and the glutton

would artificially relieve his stomach of its load, in order to prepare

for another meal.[1088] Crimes which cannot be named were common: men,

for the worst of purposes, endeavoured to make themselves look like

women; and even an emperor personated a female, and was given in

marriage to one of his Greek favourites.[1089] The streets of Rome were

as dangerous as the Pomptine marshes or the Italian forests, from

constant robbery, assault, and assassination.

The morals of the female sex were as depraved as those of men: ladies of

noble and royal blood would have lovers in their pay, and when they had

lost the attraction of personal charms, would supply their place by the

temptation of gold. One empress publicly celebrated her nuptials with an

adulterer in the absence of her lord; another gratified her wantonness

by prostitution. Even those who were not so profligate aped the manners

and habits of men, and would even meet in mock combat; and there was no

public amusement so immoral or so cruel as not to be disgraced by the

presence of the female sex. Licentiousness led to murder; and poisoning

by women was as common as it was in France and Italy in the sixteenth

century.[1090]

Times like these would even have shocked the urbane and gentle Horace.

Had he then lived, he would probably have thought such vice beyond

ridicule, and his tone might have approached more nearly to the

thundering indignation of Juvenal. “Society in the age of Horace was

becoming corrupt; in that of Juvenal it was in a state of

putrefaction.”[1091]

In this period of moral dearth the fountains of genius and literature

were dried up. The orator dared not impeach the corrupt politician, or

defend the victim of tyranny, when every one thought the best way to

secure his own safety was by trampling on the fallen favourite, now

Cæsar’s enemy.[1092] The historian dared not utter his real sentiments.

Poetry grew cold without the genial, fostering encouragement of noble

and affectionate hearts. There was criticism, grammar, declamation,

panegyric and verse-writing, but not oratory, history, or poetry.

Juvenal, though himself not free from the declamatory affectation of the

day, attacked the false literary taste of his contemporaries as

unsparingly as he did their depraved morality. From Sejanus to Cluvienus

he allowed no one to escape.

But noble as Juvenal’s hatred of vice must be allowed to be, and

fearless as are his denunciations, we look in vain throughout his poetry

for indications of an amiable and kind-hearted disposition. He was not

one to recall the lost and erring to a love of virtue, or to inspire a

pure and enthusiastic taste for literature. His prejudices were violent;

he could see nothing good in a Greek or a freedman: he hated the new

aristocracy with as bitter a hatred as Sallust. As a critic he is

ill-natured; as a moralist he is stern and misanthrophic. Mark, for

example, the gloomy bitterness with which he speaks of old age,[1093]

and contrast it with the bright side of the picture, as drawn by the

gentle Cicero in his incomparable treatise.

Deficient, however, as he was in the softer affections, his sixteen

Satires exhibit an enlightened, truthful, and comprehensive view of

Roman manners, and of the inevitable result of such corruption. Those

whose moral taste was utterly destroyed would read and listen without

profit, but they could not but tremble: his words are truth. The

conclusion of the thirteenth Satire is almost Christian. It is

unnecessary to quote from an author who is in every scholar’s memory: it

would even occupy too much space to make a fair selection from so many

fine passages. The eleventh Satire is the most pleasing, and most

partaking of the playfulness of Horace. The seventh displays the

greatest versatility and the richest fund of anecdote. The twelfth is

the most amiable. The description of the origin of civil society in the

conclusion of the fifteenth is full of sound sense and just sentiments;

whilst the way in which he speaks of the insane bigotry of the

Egyptians, exhibits his power of combining pleasantry with dignity. But

the two finest Satires are those[1094] which our own Johnson has thought

worthy of imitation: one of which (the tenth) Bishop Burnet, in his

Pastoral Charge, recommended to his clergy; and the noblest passage in

them is that which describes the fall of the infamous Sejanus.[1095] Few

men could be so well adapted to transfer the spirit of Juvenal into

English as Dr. Johnson. He had the same rude, plain-spoken,

uncompromising hatred of vice; and, though not unamiable, did his best

to conceal what amiability he possessed under a forbidding exterior. He

was not without gayety and sprightliness; but he concealed it under that

stateliness and declamatory grandeur which he attributes to Juvenal.

The historical value of Juvenal’s Satires must not be forgotten. Tacitus

lived in the same perilous times as he did; and when they had come to an

end, and it was not unsafe to speak, he wrote their public history.

Juvenal illustrates that history by displaying the social inner life of

the Romans.[1096] Their works are parallel, and each forms a commentary

upon the other. When such were the lives of individuals, one cannot

wonder at the fate of the nation.

The style of Juvenal is, generally speaking, the reflex of his mind: his

views were strong and clear: his style is vigorous and lucid also. His

morals were pure in the midst of a debased age: his language shines

forth in classic elegance in the midst of specimens of declining and

degenerate taste. His style is declamatory, but it is not artificially

rhetorical. He could not restrain himself from following the example of

Lucilius: he could not dam up the torrent of his vehement and natural

eloquence. Whether his subject is noble or disgusting, his word-painting

is perfect: we feel his sublimity—we shudder at his fidelity. The nature

of the subject causes his language to be frequently gross and offensive;

but his object always is to lay bare the deformity of vice, and to

render it loathsome. He never indulges in indecency, in order to pander

to a corrupt taste or to gratify a prurient imagination. For this reason

his pages are less dangerous than those of more elegant and less

indecent writers, who throw a veil over indelicacy, whilst they leave

those qualities which blind the moral vision and inflame the passions.

It must be remembered, also, that neither the dress, manners, nor

conversation of ancient Rome were so decent and modest as those of

modern times; and, therefore, Roman taste would not be so shocked by

plain speaking as would be the case in an age of greater social

refinement. Juvenal closes the list of Roman satirists, properly

speaking: the satirical spirit animates the piquant epigrams of his

friend Martial; but their purpose is not moral or didactic: they sting

the individual, and render him an object of scorn and disgust, but they

do not hold up vice itself to ridicule and detestation.

CHAPTER IV.

BIOGRAPHY OF LUCAN—INSCRIPTION TO HIS MEMORY—SENTIMENTS EXPRESSED IN THE

PHARSALIA—LUCAN AN UNEQUAL POET—FAULTS AND MERITS OF THE

PHARSALIA—CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS AGE—DIFFICULTIES OF HISTORICAL

POETRY—LUCAN A DESCRIPTIVE POET—SPECIMENS OF HIS POETRY—BIOGRAPHY OF

SILIUS ITALICUS—HIS CHARACTER BY PLINY—HIS POEM DULL AND TEDIOUS—HIS

DESCRIPTION OF THE ALPS.

M. ANNÆUS LUCANUS (BORN A. D. 39.)

At the head of the epic poets who flourished during the silver age

stands Lucan. He was a member of the same family as the Senecas, for the

same rhetorician of that name was his grandfather, and the Stoic

philosopher his uncle. Another of his uncles, also, L. Junius Gallio, is

mentioned in the Eusebian Chronicle as a celebrated rhetorician. This

Gallio derived his surname from being the adopted son of Jun. Gallio,

who, by some, is supposed to have been the proconsul of Achaia,

mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles.[1097]

The father of Lucan, M. Annæus Mela, was a Roman knight, who made a

large fortune as a collector of the imperial revenue. He is supposed by

some to have been identical with the geographer Pomponius Mela, who was

the author of a brief description, in three books, of the coasts of

Europe, Asia, and Africa. The style of this writer is concise, as is

suitable to a mere sketch or abridgment; and his matter, although

derived from other sources, and not from personal observation, is

accurate and interesting. The poet was born at Corduba (Cordova,) on the

beautiful banks of the Bætis (Guadalquiver.) His birthplace is thus

elegantly alluded to by Statius, in a poem addressed to his widow, on

the anniversary of his birth:—

Vatis Apollinei magno memorabilis ortu

Lux redit, Aonidum turba favete sacris.

Hæc meruit, cum te terris Lucane dedisset

Mixtus Castaliæ Bætis ut esset aquæ.

_Stat. Genethl._

Pliny tells us that on his infant lips, as on those of Hesiod, a swarm

of bees settled, and thus gave presage of his poetical career; a tale

which owes its origin entirely to the Greek tradition. Much which rests

upon no foundation has been mixed up with the extant lives of Lucan; for

example, the favour shown to him, whilst a child, by Nero; his

consequent elevation in his boyhood to the rank of a senator; and his

defeat of the emperor in a poetical contest at the quinquennial games,

instituted by the latter, in which no one entered with any other view

than that their royal antagonist might have the credit of a mock

victory.[1098] The enmity of the jealous emperor can be accounted for

without having recourse to so insane a competition.

It is probable that Lucan was very young when he came to Rome; that his

literary reputation was soon established; and that Nero, who could not

bear the idea of a rival, forbade him to recite his poems, which was now

the common mode of publication. Nor was he content with silencing him as

a poet, but also would not allow him to plead as an advocate.[1099]

Smarting under this provocation he hastily joined a conspiracy against

the emperor’s life, and signalized himself by the bitterness of his

hatred against his powerful enemy. The ringleader of this plot was

Piso,[1100] a tragic poet of some talent, a skilful orator, and a

munificent man. But he was deficient in decision and infirm of purpose:

the plot therefore failed. When Lucan’s passion cooled he as quickly

repented, and was pardoned on condition of pointing out his

confederates. In the vain hope of saving himself from the monster’s

vengeance, he actually impeached his mother. The upright historian

contrasts this stain on the poet’s character with the courage which

Epicharis displayed. This noble woman was incapable of treason. Tacitus

describes the resolution with which she scorned the question.[1101] “The

scourge, the flames, the rage of the executioners, who tortured her the

more savagely, lest they should be scorned by a woman, were powerless to

extort a false confession.” Lucan never received the reward which he

purchased by treachery. The warrant for his death was issued, and he

caused his veins to be cut asunder. As the stream of his life’s blood

flowed away, he repeated from his own poem the description of a soldier

expiring from his wounds.[1102] He died in the twenty-seventh year of

his age; and the following inscription to his memory has been attributed

to Nero:—

M. Annæo Lucano Cordubensi Poetæ

Beneficio Neronis. Fama servata.

The sentiments contained in the Pharsalia, so far as he dared express

them, breathe a love of freedom, and an attachment to the old Roman

republicanism. Although the imperial patronage which he at first

enjoyed, and, perhaps, the better promise of the commencement of Nero’s

reign, tempted him to indulge in courtly flattery; still, even at that

time, his praises of liberty evidently came from the heart. As the poem

proceeds his sentiments become more exalted; his virtuous indignation

gradually rises, until it pours forth a torrent of burning satire on the

inhuman tyrant. This poem, the only one of his works which survives, is

an epic in ten books; its subject, the civil war between Cæsar and

Pompey. It bears evident marks of having been left unfinished, and of

not having received the last touches from the hand of the author. It was

preceded by four other shorter poems—the first on the Death of Hector;

the second on the Visit of Orpheus to the Infernal Regions; the third,

on the Burning of Rome; the fourth addressed to his wife Polla

Argentaria. He also wrote some prose works; and Martial attributes to

him some poems on lighter subjects.[1103]

Lucan is an unequal poet: his Pharsalia is defaced with great faults and

blemishes; but at the same time it possesses peculiar beauties. Its

subject is a noble one and full of historic interest, and is treated

with spirit, brilliance, and animation. Its arrangement is that of

annals, and therefore it wants the unity of an epic poem: it has not the

connectedness of history, because the poet naturally selected only the

most striking and romantic incidents; and yet, notwithstanding these

defects in the plan, the historical pictures themselves are beautifully

drawn. The characters of Cæsar and Pompey, for example, are

master-pieces. Again, some passages have neither the dignity of prose

nor the melody of poetry; whilst others are scarcely inferior to any

written by the best Latin poets. This inequality has caused the great

diversity of opinions which have been held by critics respecting the

merits of Lucan. Some have unjustly depreciated him; others, as

groundlessly, have lauded him to the skies. Quintilian commended his

ardent enthusiasm and lucidity of expression,[1104] but qualified his

praise by adding, that he would be admired by orators rather than by

poets. Corneille preferred him to Virgil, of whom he was obviously a

warm admirer. His poem furnishes materials and reason for this diversity

of judgment; but it may safely be asserted that his faults are due to

the age in which he lived, whilst his beauties were the fruits and

developments of his own native genius. His principal merit is

originality: although he was not great enough to lead the taste of the

age, and to rise superior to its false principles, he did not condescend

to be a servile imitator even of those poets whose reputation was firmly

established. There are many parallelisms between his poetry and that of

Virgil, but they are the parallelisms of a student, not of a plagiarist.

Without adopting the unauthorized assumptions, found in some of his

biographies, that he was educated under the immediate superintendence of

his uncle Seneca, that Remmius Palæmon taught him grammar, Virginius

Flaccus rhetoric, and Cornutus philosophy, it is clear that his taste

was formed and his talents drawn out in an age, the characteristics of

which were pedantic erudition, inflated rhetoric, and dogmatic

philosophy. It is clear, also, that even though Seneca was not his

tutor, still the conceit and affectation which dimmed the transcendent

abilities of the philosopher, exercised a baneful influence over the

literary taste of his contemporaries. In the midst of these influences

Lucan was educated, and for that reason his poem is disfigured by

commonplace maxims, pompous diction, an affectation of learning, a

rhetorical exuberance which outstripped its subjects, and therefore

produces the effect of frigidity. In a poem, the characters and events

of which are historical, the real is in too strong contrast to the

ideal, hence the effect of both is marred. The fidelity expected of the

historian circumscribes the creative power of the poet. To the poet who

constructs his work out of the materials of epochs which are beyond the

reach of history, the whole field of the past is open. The only limits

within which he must restrain his genius are those of the probable:

within these bounds he may conjure up the most magnificent ideal forms;

he may use the most gorgeous imagery, the most supernatural machinery:

the whole wears an air of historic truth; as there are no realities with

which his ideal can be compared and tested, truth never appears to be

violated.

But in history, almost contemporaneous with the age of the poet, every

circumstance is recorded, every character well known and estimated. If

an act of bravery is exaggerated into one of superhuman heroism, or one

who is known to have been a man, although a great man, recast in the

heroic mould, we are struck at once with the falsehood: and therefore

the poet cannot venture on such efforts of genius. In a train of events,

which the page of history enables us to trace from the beginning to the

end, no difficulties can occur deserving of supernatural machinery, no

_dignus vindice nodus_; and thus, in the place of the Olympian Pantheon

of Homer and Virgil, Lucan can only deify the popular but unpoetical

principle of chance, and personify Fortune.

This position may appear inconsistent with the charm which confessedly

belongs to the modern historical romance; but then it is to be

remembered, that the interest we take in the historical portions is

purely historical, enlivened by the events grouping themselves round the

hero: in fact, the interest of biography is united with that of history.

The strictest accuracy, therefore, in matters which fall within the

range of history is perfectly compatible. The romantic interest depends

on the inner or social life of the characters—which forms no part of

history—in which, as there is no standard of comparison, the imagination

of the poet is quite free and unfettered. But this is totally different

from the plan on which such a poem as the Pharsalia is constructed. The

vision of the genius of Rome which appeared to Cæsar at the fatal

Rubicon, those which haunt the slumbers of the Cæsareans in the

plundered camp of Pompey, and the dream of Pompey, in which the secrets

of the infernal regions are laid open by the shade of his departed wife

Julia, are the nearest approaches to that invisible world which the

imagination of Homer disclosed, and which Virgil reproduced;[1105] but

these are only isolated passages.

It is impossible to be at once an historian and a poet: in the one

character the author must restrain the flights of his imagination; in

the other, he must sacrifice truth. Nor is there any doubt of which

character we demand the conservation, when matters of history are

concerned. We desiderate truth: we wish moot points to be settled and

doubts solved. All imaginative pictures we look upon as interruptions,

and cast them aside as warping the judgment and giving prejudiced views.

Hence, our admiration of Lucan is called forth, not by considering his

poem as an epic, but for the sake of isolated scenes, such as the naval

victory off Marseilles; splendid descriptions, such as that of the

cruelties of Marius and Sulla; felicitous comparisons, that, for

example, of Pompey to an aged oak; and the epigrammatic terseness which

gives force, as well as beauty, to his sayings. In a single line, for

instance—

Pauperiorque fuit tunc primum Cæsare Roma—

he describes the wealth and avarice of the conqueror, and in the

well-known verse—

Victrix causa Diis placuit sed victa Catoni—

he depicts the disinterestedness of Cato. To this may be added, that the

subject of the Pharsalia is, although a period of the deepest historical

interest, ill adapted to poetry. Events so nearly contemporary were

fitter for history and panegyric than for poetry; and although they give

scope for descriptive power and bold imagery, they are deficient in that

mysterious and romantic character which is required for an epic poem.

His imagination was rich—his enthusiasm refused to be curbed. They were

such as we might suppose would be nurtured by the warm and sunny climate

of Spain. His sentiments often exhibit that chivalrous tone which

distinguishes the Spanish poets of modern times. We may discern the

nobleness, the liberality, the courage, which once marked the high-born

Spanish gentleman; and the grave and thoughtful wisdom which makes

Spanish literature so rich in proverbs, and which peeps out even from

under the unreal conventionalisms of the contemporary Roman philosophy.

Description forms the principal feature in the poetry of Lucan; it

occupies more than one half of the Pharsalia; so that it might almost as

appropriately be termed a descriptive as an epic poem. Description, in

fact, constitutes one of the characteristic features of Roman literature

in its decline, because poetry had more than ever become an art, and the

epoch one of erudition; and thus a treasure of imagery was stored up

suitable for descriptive embellishment. The finest parts of Persius are

descriptive: even Martial, brief though his pieces are, delights in it;

and facility in this department is the strong point of Silius Italicus,

and the sole merit of Valerius Flaccus. Owing to the enthusiasm with

which Lucan throws himself into this kind of writing, he abounds in

minute detail. He reminds one of the descriptive talent possessed in so

eminent a degree by our own Thomson. Not a feature escapes his notice,

whether it suggest ideas of the beautiful, the sublime, or the terrible.

He is not content, as Virgil is, with a sketch—with broad lights and

shadows; he delights in a finished picture; he possesses the power of

placing his subject strongly before the eyes, leaving little or nothing

for the imagination to supply. He omits no means of attaining

descriptive truth;[1106] the inward state of feeling, the character of

each passion, is presented, not so much in its moral and psychical as in

its physical developments; that which is internal is exhibited in its

external symptoms, with the hand of a painter and the skill of the

physiognomist. Virgil sketches, Lucan paints; the latter describes

physically—the former philosophically. The following passages, which

describe the passage of the Rubicon and the death of Pompey, are noble

specimens of Lucan’s style:—

Jam gelidas Cæsar cursu superaverat Alpes,

Ingentesque animo motus, bellumque futurum

Ceperat. Ut ventum est parvi Rubiconis ad undas,

Ingens visa duci patriæ trepidantis imago,

Clara per obscuram vultu mœstissima noctem

Turrigero canos effundens vertice crines,

Cæsarie lacera, nudisque adstare lacertis,

Et gemitu permixta loqui! Quo tenditis ultra?

Quo fertis mea signa, viri? Si jure venitis,

Si cives, huc usque licet. Tunc perculit horror

Membra ducis, riguere comæ, gressumque coercens

Languor in extrema tenuit vestigia ripa.

* * * * *

Cæsar ut adversam superato gurgite ripam

Attigit, Hesperiæ vetitis et constitit arvis,

Hic, ait, hic, pacem, temerataque jura relinquo;

Te, Fortuna, sequor; procul hinc jam fœdera sunto.

Credidimus fatis, utendum est judice bello.

Now Cæsar, marching swift with winged haste,

The summits of the frozen Alps had past;

With vast events and enterprises fraught,

And future wars revolving in his thought.

Now near the banks of Rubicon he stood;

When lo! as he surveyed the narrow flood,

Amidst the dusky horrors of the night,

A wondrous vision stood confessed to sight.

Her awful head Rome’s reverend image reared,

Trembling and sad the matron form appeared;

A towering crown her hoary temples bound,

And her torn tresses rudely hung around;

Her naked arms uplifted ere she spoke,

Then, groaning, thus the mournful silence broke:

Presumptuous men! oh, whither do you run?

Oh, whither bear you these my ensigns on?

If friends to right, if citizens of Rome,

Here to your utmost barrier are you come.

She said; and sunk within the closing shade.

Astonishment and dread the chief invade;

Stiff rose his starting hair; he stood dismayed,

And on the bank his slackening steps were stayed.

* * * * *

The leader now had passed the torrent o’er,

And reached fair Italy’s forbidden shore;

Then rearing on the hostile bank his head,

Here farewell peace and injured laws! he said:

Since faith is broke, and leagues are set aside,

Henceforth thou, goddess Fortune, art my bride!

Let fate and war the great event decide. _Rowe._

Jam venerat horæ

Terminus extremæ, Phariamque ablatus in alnum

Perdiderat jam jura sui. Tum stringere ferrum

Regia monstra parant. Ut vidit cominus enses

Involvit vultus; atque indignatus apertum

Fortunæ præbere caput, tunc lumina pressit,

Continuitque animam, ne quas effundere voces

Posset et æternam fletu corrumpere famam.

At postquam mucrone latus funestus Achillas

Perfodit, nullo gemitu consensit ad ictum.

Now in the boat defenceless Pompey sat,

Surrounded and abandoned to his fate.

Nor long they hold him in their power aboard,

E’en every villain drew his ruthless sword:

The chief perceived their purpose soon, and spread

His Roman gown, with patience, o’er his head;

And when the cursed Achillas pierced his breast,

His rising indignation close repressed.

No signs, no groans, his dignity profaned,

No tear his still unsullied glory stained.

Unmoved and firm he fixed him on his seat,

And died, as when he lived and conquered, great.

C. SILIUS ITALICUS.

C. Silius Italicus was born in the reign of Tiberius, A. D. 25. The

place of his birth is unknown. His surname, Italicus, has led some to

suppose that he was a native of Italica, in Spain. But it is not

probable that, if this were the case, his friend and fellow-courtier

Martial, when he compared his eloquence to that of Cicero, and his

poetry to that of Virgil,[1107] called him the glory of the Castalian

sisters,[1108] and felicitated him on his political honours, would have

forgotten to claim him as a countryman. Others, with somewhat more show

of reason, have imagined that his birthplace was the city of Corfinium,

in Pelignia, which was called Italica,[1109] because it was the

head-quarters of the confederates in the social war; whilst Stephens

mentions a little town in Sicily, of the same name, which might have

been his native place.[1110]

Silius was celebrated as an advocate; but in that age of affected and

rhetorical display, a high reputation does not prove that his eloquence,

although it might have displayed a similar elegance of language, was

more lively and stirring than his poetry. He was consul A. D. 68; an

office which was also filled by his son,[1111] and by another member of

his family.[1112] He was afterwards proconsul of Asia; the duties of

which lucrative office he appears to have performed with credit to

himself. He was very wealthy; and, as he grew old, retired from the

perils of public life to enjoy his affluence, and the retirement of

literary ease in his numerous villas. One cannot be surprised that an

orator and a poet especially delighted in the house of Virgil, near

Naples, and the Academy of Cicero, of both which he was the fortunate

possessor. He lived to the age of seventy-five, and then starved himself

to death, because he could not bear the pain of disease. “I have just

been informed,” writes Pliny the Younger, to his friend Caninius,[1113]

“that Silius Italicus has put an end to his existence by starvation, at

his Neapolitan villa. He had an incurable carbuncle, from the annoyance

of which he took refuge in death, with a firm and irrevocable constancy.

He enjoyed happiness and prosperity to his dying day, if we except the

loss of the younger of his two sons; but the elder and superior one

survived him in the enjoyment of prosperity, and even of consular rank.

The belief that he had voluntarily come forward as a public accuser

injured his reputation in the reign of Nero; but, as a friend of

Vitellius, his conduct was wise and his behaviour courteous. His career

in the proconsulate of Asia was an honourable one, for he washed out the

stain of his former activity by a praiseworthy abstinence from public

affairs. He had no influence with the great; but then he was safe from

envy. All courted him, and were assiduous in paying their respects to

him; and as ill health confined him to his bed, his chamber was thronged

with visitors, beyond what might have been expected from his rank and

station. Whenever he could spare time for writing, he passed it in

learned conversation. His poems display elaborate care rather than

genius: sometimes he invited criticism by recitations. Yielding to the

suggestion of advancing years, he at length retired from Rome, and

resided in Campania; nor had the accession of a new emperor (Trajan)

power to entice him from his retirement. High praise to the monarch

under whose rule he was free to act so!—high praise to him who had

courage to use that freedom! His love of virtù caused in him a

reprehensible passion for buying: he was the possessor of more than one

villa in the same localities; and he so delighted in the newest purchase

as to neglect that which he inhabited before. He had a vast collection

of books, besides statues and busts, which he not only possessed, but

almost worshipped. He kept Virgil’s birthday more religiously than his

own, and had more busts of him than any one else, especially at Naples,

where he was in the habit of visiting his tomb, as if it were a temple.

In this tranquil retirement he exceeded his seventy-fifth year, his

constitution being delicate rather than weakly. As he was the last

consul made by Nero, so he died the last of those whom he had made. It

is also worthy of remark that the consul, in whose year of office Nero

died, died the last of Nero’s consuls. When I call this to mind, I feel

compassion for human frailty: for what is so brief as the longest span

of human life!”

Little interest attaches to the biography of one who owed a life of

uninterrupted prosperity to his being the favourite and intimate of two

emperors; the one, a blood-thirsty tyrant—the other, a gross

sensualist.[1114] His ponderous work survives—the dullest and most

tedious poem in the Latin language. Its title is “_Punica_:” it consists

of seventeen books, and contains a history in heroic verse of the second

Punic war. The Æneid of Virgil was his model, and the narrative of Livy

furnished his materials. Niebuhr states that he read through the whole

of his works with great care, and that he was quite convinced that he

had taken every thing from Livy, of whose work his is only a

paraphrase.[1115] The criticism of Pliny the Younger is, upon the whole,

just: “_Scribebat carmina majori cura quam ingenio_;” for, although it

is impossible to read his poem with pleasure as a whole, his

versification is harmonious, and will often, in point of smoothness,

bear comparison with that of Virgil. The following passage is quoted by

C. Barthius as one of the most favourable specimens of his sentiments

and style; and Cellarius, whose praise is extravagantly fulsome, gives

it the epithet of “Aurea:”—

Ipsa quidem virtus sibimet pulcherrima merces;

Dulce tamen venit ad manes quem gloria vitæ

Durat apud superos, nec edunt oblivia laudem.

Some of his episodes, if considered as separate pieces, will repay the

trouble of perusal; and the following passage, which Addison thought

worthy of translation, may be taken as a fair specimen of his

descriptive powers:—

THE ALPS.

Cuncta gelu canâque æternum grandine tecta,

Atque ævi glaciem cohibent: riget ardua montis

Ætherii facies, surgentique obvia Phœbo

Duratas nescit flammis mollire pruinas.

Quantum Tartareus regni pallentis hiatus

Ad manes imos atque atræ stagna paludis

A supera tellure patet; tam longa per auras

Erigitur tellus et cœlum intercipit umbrà.

Nullum ver usquam, nullique æstatis honores;

Sola jugis habitat diris sedesque tuetur

Perpetuas deformis hyems: illa undique nubes

Huc atras agit et mixtos cum grandine nimbos.

Nam cuncti flatus ventique furentia regna

Alpinâ posuere domo caligat in altis

Obtutus saxis, abeuntque in nubila montes.

Stiff with eternal ice, and hid in snow,

That fell a thousand centuries ago,

The mountain stands; nor can the rising sun

Unfix her frosts and teach them how to run:

Deep as the dark infernal waters lie

From the bright regions of the cheerful sky,

So far the proud ascending rocks invade

Heaven’s upper realms, and cast a dreadful shade.

No spring, no summer, on the mountain seen,

Smiles with gay fruits or with delightful green,

But hoary winter, unadorned and bare,

Dwells in the dire retreat and freezes there,

There she assembles all her blackest storms,

And the rude hail or rattling tempests forms;

Thither the loud tumultuous winds resort,

And on the mountain keep their boisterous court,

That in thick showers her rocky summit shrouds,

And darkens all the broken view with clouds. _Addison._

CHAPTER V.

C. VALERIUS FLACCUS—FAULTS OF THE ARGONAUTICA—PAPINIUS STATIUS—BEAUTY OF

HIS MINOR POEMS—INCAPABLE OF EPIC POETRY—DOMITIAN—EPIGRAM—MARTIAL—HIS

BIOGRAPHY—PROFLIGACY OF THE AGE IN WHICH HE LIVED—IMPURITY OF HIS

WRITINGS—FAVOURABLE SPECIMENS OF HIS POETRY.

C. VALERIUS FLACCUS.

C. Valerius Flaccus flourished in the reign of Vespasian; and, according

to an epigram of Martial, in which the poet advises his friend to leave

the Muses for the drier but more profitable profession of a pleader, he

was born at Patavium[1116] (Padua.) The frequent addition of the

surnames Setinus Balbus have caused it to be supposed that he was a

native of Setia, in Campania (Sezzo;) but it is impossible to form any

satisfactory conjecture as to their signification, and the statement of

Martial is too definite to admit of a doubt. Quintilian[1117] asserts

that, when he wrote, V. Flaccus had _lately_ died: he was, therefore,

probably cut off prematurely about A. D. 88.

His only poem which is extant is entitled “_Argonautica_,” and is an

imitation, and, in some parts, a translation, of the Greek poem of

Apollonius Rhodius on the same subject. It is addressed to the Emperor,

and in the proëmium he pays a compliment to Domitian on his poetry, and

to Titus on his victories over the Jews.

He evidently did not live to complete his original design: even the

eighth book is unfinished; and, from the events still remaining to be

related, he probably planned an epic poem of the same length as that of

Virgil, whose style and versification he endeavoured to imitate. An

Italian poet, John Baptista Pius, continued the subject, by an addition

to the eighth book, and by subjoining two more, the incidents of which

were partly borrowed from Apollonius.

Of his merits Quintilian speaks favourably in the passage already

alluded to, and says, that in him literature had sustained a severe

loss. The severer criticism of Scaliger is more precise and more

judicious:—“Immaturâ morte præreptus acerbum item poëma suum nobis

reliquit. Est autem omnino duriusculus, penitus vero nudus Gratiarum

comitate.” The defects of the Argonautica are, in fact, rather of a

negative than a positive character. There are no glaring faults or

blemishes; none of the affectation or rhetorical artifices which belong

to the period of the decline. There may be a little occasional hardness,

and a few awkward expressions and paraphrases, but there is no bombast

to outrage good taste, and no unmetrical cadences to offend the ear. But

there is no genius, no inspiration, no thrilling fervour, no thoughts

that breathe or words that burn. He never rises above a dead level.

Every thing is in accordance with decent and direct propriety. He has

some talent as a descriptive poet: his versification is harmonious, and

he attains to those superficial excellencies which are found in the

prize poem of a pains-taking, ingenious, and well-educated scholar.

Virgil was an imitator: that is, his taste, like Roman taste,

universally was formed and trained by imitation; but his spirit

disdained these trammels, and soared to originality. V. Flaccus is

scarcely ever original except when he is commonplace: he imitates Virgil

successfully, as far as the outward graces of style are concerned; but

in the charm of natural simplicity, he always falls short of his great

original.

P. PAPINIUS STATIUS (BORN A. D. 61.)

Towards the middle of the first century of the Christian era,[1118]

there arrived at Rome, from Naples, a grammarian, named P. Papinius

Statius. He opened a school, and soon became so celebrated as a public

instructor, that he became tutor to the young Domitian, whose favour and

affection continued after he became emperor. Some of his fame was also

founded on gaining, in his boyhood, the prize in many public contests of

poetry. Every year between the age of thirteen and nineteen, he is said

to have been crowned. These contests were partly of an improvisatorial

character; and in an age when public readings and recitations were in

vogue, and were the means which poets had of gaining fame and patronage,

success of this kind was highly valued. The subject of one of his poems

is said to have been the conflagration of the Capitol, during the

struggle between the Vitellians and the supporters of Vespasian.[1119]

Statius, however, seems to have possessed no higher degree of poetical

power than a happy facility in versification, for he died[1120] and left

no works which have stood the test of time.

A son, however, inherited poetical talents of the same kind, but of a

far higher order than those of his father, and although, for a long

time, he was entirely dependent upon his works for the means of living,

and, notwithstanding thunders of applause, must starve, unless he can

sell his play to the manager Paris,[1121] the sunshine of imperial

favour, which his father had enjoyed, shone upon him.[1122] He purchased

patronage, however, at the expense of grossly flattering the tyrant.

This son, who bore the same name as his father, was the author of the

Silvæ, Thebaid, and Achilleid. He was born A. D. 61, and died in the

prime of life, A. D. 95, at Naples, his native city. As no interesting

particulars are recorded respecting his life, and as he is never

mentioned by any classical author except Juvenal,[1123] it is impossible

to say how the opinion arose which was entertained by his admirer Dante,

and others, that he was in secret a defender of the Christians, and also

himself a believer.[1124]

He was a true Italian in the character of his genius. He had a thorough

perception of the beauties of nature. His Silvæ are full of truthful

pictures. He possessed ready facility in versification, which was

surpassed by no poet of classic antiquity except Ovid, and that

improvisatorial power for which his countrymen in the present day are so

often celebrated. As long as he was content to be a poet on a small

scale he was eminently successful. His Sylvæ contain many poetical

incidents which might stand by themselves as perfect fugitive

pieces,—brief effusions, suggested by statues[1125] and buildings,[1126]

verses of compliment[1127] and delicate flattery,[1128] or

condolence[1129] or congratulation. It matters not how light or trifling

the subject, he can raise it and adorn it. He writes with equal beauty

on the tree of his friend Atedius;[1130] the death of a parrot; of the

emperor’s lion;[1131] the locks of Flavius Earinus;[1132] the rude

freedom of the Saturnalia.[1133] It is in these unpretending poems that

we see his natural and unaffected elegance, his harmonious ear, and his

truthfulness of perception. But the case is totally different when the

subject is above him.[1134] He had neither grasp of mind, nor vigour of

imagination, to fit him for the task of an epic poet; and, hence, his

great work, the Thebaid, and his other unfinished epic, the Achilleid,

are complete failures.

In his minor poems he seems to trust to the natural powers of his

genius; he never strains at producing effect, nor is he too solicitous

about exact finish and laborious polish. Although not improvisatorial,

they partake of that character, and have all its freshness combined with

the advantage of written and corrected performances. His thoughts are

inspired by his subject; and its reality, which he was capable of

appreciating, gives a life to his compositions. But the principal fault

in his Silvæ is too great a display of Greek learning. Every page is

full of mythological allusions, which sometimes render his graceful

verses dry and wearisome, and must have rendered them acceptable to

those only who were well versed in Greek literature: they never could

have been universally popular. The qualities which recommended his Silvæ

do not adorn his epic poetry. His imaginary heroes do not inspire and

warm his imagination: he is not affected by their personality in the

same way in which he is by the lawns and groves, and sun, and forests,

and skies of Italy.

For this deficiency he attempts to compensate by extravagant bombast,

totally out of keeping with the action of the poem, and by an attention

to the theoretical principles of art, and an elaborate finish which must

have cost him many hours of toil. Yet this perseverance is thrown away,

and the effect produced by the contrast between the action and essence

of the poem, and the language in which it is externally clothed,

produces an effect contrary to that which was intended.

He was a skilful draughtsman, a gorgeous colourist, a pleasing

landscape-painter, and a diligent student of the rules of art; but his

genius could not rise to the highest departments of art—he could not

give the mind or the _morale_ to those characters whose external

features he was so apt in delineating. He owes the estimation in which

he is held as an epic poet not to his absolute but his relative merit.

He was the best of the heroic poets of his day. Statius, notwithstanding

his defects, was evidently a profound student as well as an admirer of

the Homeric poems; and there are two points in which he has proved

himself a successful imitator. These are his battles and his similes.

His descriptions of the former are stirring and dramatic, and some of

his similes will bear comparison with the best Latin specimens of this

kind of illustration. When it is remembered that no epic poet has

approached more nearly to Homer in the use of the simile than Dante, and

that he equals the Greek bard in sublime and picturesque description, it

may easily be imagined that these were the qualities in the poems of

Statius which especially called forth his admiration.

A few words only are necessary to describe the nature and subject-matter

of the poems of Statius. The Silvæ consist of thirty-two separate

pieces. They are all hexametrical, with the exception of four in

hendecasyllabics,[1135] one in Alcaic,[1136] and one in Sapphic

metre.[1137] Each of the five books in which these poems are arranged

has a prose dedication to some friend prefixed; the first being

addressed to the poet Stella, the common friend of himself and

Martial.[1138] The title Silvæ was given to these poems, on account of

the very quality which constitutes their especial charm. They are the

rude materials of thought, springing up spontaneously in all their wild

luxuriance from the rich natural soil of the poet’s imagination,

unpruned, untrimmed, ignorant of that cultivated art which an affected

and artificial age thought necessary to constitute a finished poem.

“Such extemporaneous performances as these,” says Quintilian, “are

called Silvæ: the author subsequently re-examines and corrects his

effusions.”[1139] The Thebaid is comprised in twelve books, and its

subject is the ancient Greek legends respecting the war of the Seven

against Thebes. The composition of this work preceded the publication of

the Silvæ. Achilleid was intended, doubtless, to embrace all the

exploits of Achilles, but only two books were completed.

DOMITIAN.

A paraphrase of the Phænomena of Aratus belongs to this age. It has been

ascribed to Germanicus, but its real author was Domitian, who, as well

as Nero, wrote verses.[1140] As far as language and versification are

concerned, it is not without merit; but the subject is unsuitable to

poetry.[1141] Domitian had taste, although his talents did not deserve

the adulatory commendations of Quintilian;[1142] but he encouraged

learned men: and to his encouragement we owe those distinguished

contemporary writers who, for one generation, arrested the downward

progress of Roman literature.

EPIGRAM.

The Greek Epigram was originally, as the word implies, simply an

inscription. It was therefore short and concise; its metre elegiac, as

especially suited to the periodic structure of the sentiment, and its

characteristic qualities, terseness and neatness. So long as it retained

this character it was free from bitterness; and the principal element of

success in this species of composition was tact rather than genius, and

a cultivated taste rather than poetical inspiration. Not only were

Catullus, Virgil, and Ovid epigrammatists, but some Roman _literati_,

arrived at mediocrity, or even excellence, in epigram, who were not

capable of becoming great poets. Julius Cæsar wrote one on Terence, and

perhaps the following neatly-turned lines; although they have been

ascribed to Augustus and Germanicus:—

Thrax puer astricto glacie dum ludit in Hebro

Pondere concretas frigore rupit aquas;

Dumque imæ partes rapido traherentur ab amne,

Abscidit tenerum lubrica testa caput.

Orba quod inventum mater dum conderet urna,

Hoc peperi flammis, cetera, dixit, aquis.

Lutatius Catulus was the author of a quatrain on Roscius the comedian;

and the Anthology, amongst numerous others, contains one by

Augustus,[1143] and four of no merit by Mæcenas,[1144] together with

those beautiful lines addressed by Hadrian to his soul, which Pope has

imitated in his “Dying Christian:”—

Animula vagula blandula,

Hospes comesque corporis,

Quæ nunc abibis in loca?

Pallidula rigida nudula

Nec ut soles dabis jocos.

To the original characteristics of epigram the Romans added that which

constitutes an epigram in the modern sense of the term, pointedness

either in jest or earnest, and the bitterness of personal satire. Common

sense, shrewdness, and an acute observation of human nature were thus

superadded to Greek gracefulness and elegance; and the same nation which

reduced the wild and unpremeditated sarcasms of the Greek stage into the

symmetrical form of satire, produced also the epigram as written by the

pen of Martial. The same characteristics of the Roman mind which mark

satire are visible also in epigram. Epigram is the concentration of

satire. The desultory vagueness which is allowable in the latter, the

variety of subjects, which are touched upon with irregular and

unrestrained freedom, are, in the former, limited and defined. One idea

is selected, and to this all the powers of the writer’s acute mind are

directed, and made to converge as to a point. It is not often that the

harmless elements of Greek wit, such as the pun, or the pleasantry by

surprise or unexpected turn (although these sometimes occur,[1145]) are

found in the Roman epigram. Smartness is generally connected with

severity. The same bitter spirit which dictated the Archilochian epodes

of Horace, which breathes throughout the indignant lines of Juvenal,

points the shafts of Martial. The blows, however, which he aimed at vice

could not be deadly, because he had no faith in virtue, and because he

delighted to grovel in the impurity which he described.

M. VALERIUS MARTIALIS (BORN A. D. 43.)

All that is known of the life of Martial is derived from his own works;

and this is but little, for he says nothing of his early years, and did

not begin to write until the reign of Domitian. Of his parents he

undutifully tells us that they were fools for teaching him to

read.[1146] He was born at Bilbilis, a Spanish town in the province of

Tarragon,[1147] of the position of which nothing is known for certain,

except that its site was an elevated one,[1148] overlooking the river

Salo, which flowed round its walls. It appears to have prided itself on

its manufactures in gold and iron;[1149] to have been particularly

famous for its arms;[1150] and to have been one of the Roman colonies

dignified with the title of Augusta.[1151] As Vespasian had conferred on

the poet’s native town, in common with the rest of Spain, the _jus

Latii_,[1152] Martial was by birth a Roman citizen; and in the days of

his popularity obtained this privilege for many of his friends.[1153]

His birthday was March 1,[1154] A. D. 43, the third year of the reign of

Claudius.

In the twenty-second year of his age, the twelfth year of the reign of

Nero,[1155] he migrated to Rome. He was a great favourite of Titus and

Domitian, by whom the “_jus trium liberorum_” was conferred upon

him,[1156] together with the rank of a Roman knight,[1157] and the

honorary title of tribune.[1158] In the reign of the latter he was

appointed to the office of court poet, and received a pension from the

imperial treasury.[1159] Hence during the latter part of his residence

in Rome it is almost certain that, although not rich, he enjoyed a

competency. He had a house in the city, and a little villa at Nomentum

given him by Domitian.[1160] Nevertheless, he is constantly complaining

of his poverty, and thinks that every one grows rich but himself. He

laments that poets receive nothing but compliments for their verses,

whilst lawyers, and even common criers, gain an ample maintenance:—that

“Minerva was a better patron than Apollo; a fuller stream of wealth

flowed through the Forum than from the fountain of Helicon, or the

channel of Permessus.”[1161] He complains that he spends all he has, and

either borrows money from his friends, or takes to another the presents

he has given him, and querulously asks him to purchase them back

again.[1162] The roof of his villa lets in the rain; and when his friend

Stella sends him some tiles to mend it he reproaches him for not sending

also a toga to protect the poor inmate.[1163]

All this may have proceeded from the discontented feelings which poets

and literary men so often indulge at seeing genius unrewarded, and

affluence attending talents which, although if not so high an order, are

of more general utility. Perhaps, too, though not absolutely poor, he

was straitened in his circumstances, considering his social position and

the demands which this entailed upon him. During thirty-five years he

lived at Rome the life of a flatterer, and a dependant,[1164] and then

returned to his native town.[1165] As Horace, when in his quiet country

retirement, sometimes regrets the enjoyments of the capital, although

when at Rome he sighs for the pleasures of rural life, so Martial, when

at Rome, longed for Bilbilis, and when he returned to Bilbilis regretted

Rome. At this late period of his life he married a Spanish lady, named

Marcella, whose property was amply sufficient to maintain him in

affluence. Her estate he considers a little kingdom; her gardens he

would not exchange for those of Alcinous; he praises her bowers, groves,

fountains, streamlets, fish-ponds, and meadows; and tells us the climate

is so genial that the olive-grounds are green in January, and the roses

blow twice in the year, like those of Pæstum.[1166] His wife he praises

for her rare genius and sweet manners; he tells her that no one could

discover her provincial origin; that her equal could not be found

amongst the most elegant ladies in the capital; and when inclined to

forget Rome she alone is all that Rome ever was to him:—

Tu desiderium dominæ mihi mitius urbis

Esse jubes; Romam tu mihi sola facis.[1167]

But, notwithstanding the delicate compliment which he pays to his rich

wife—a compliment dictated probably more by his habit of courtly

flattery than by sincerity of affection—he evidently pined for Rome. He

was fitted for crowds and not for solitude: his spirit was not pure

enough to commune with itself. His delight had been so long to study the

human heart in its worst developments, to drag forth to public view its

blackest plague-spots, that he would miss the foul models which he had

so long studied. Provincial life was therefore utter dulness to him; his

only enjoyment was to reproduce the results of his observations on the

life of the capital. Combining in himself the apparently inconsistent

characters of the flatterer and the satirist, he needed great men to

whom he might look up for patronage and approbation, as well as moral

wounds to probe and subjects to anatomize. Rome alone supplied these;

and when he lost them he lost the intellectual food necessary for his

existence. The absence of his accustomed pursuits, and the irremediable

void thus created, is evident in many of his epigrams.

The time of his death is uncertain, as the date of Pliny’s elegant

epistle to Priscus, in which it is mentioned, cannot be

determined.[1168] But as it is probable that the eleventh book of his

Epigrams was published in the year in which he left Rome for Bilbilis,

and as he apologizes in the dedication of his twelfth book to Priscus

for his obstinate indolence during a period of three years, his death

cannot have taken place before A. D. 104. It is, however, generally

supposed that his life was not prolonged much beyond this date. His

death may have been hastened by his distaste for a provincial life, and

by the malice and envy of his new neighbours.[1169]

According to his own account, in an epigram,[1170] in which he contrasts

himself with an effeminate fop, his appearance was rough and unpolished,

his shaggy hair refused to curl, his cheeks were well-whiskered, and his

voice was louder than the roar of a lioness.[1171] It is impossible to

believe the assertion which he makes respecting his own moral character,

namely, that although his verses are licentious his life was virtuous,

Lasciva est nobis pagina, vita proba est.[1172]

—although, measured by the corrupt standard of morals which disgraced

the age in which he lived, he was probably not worse than most of his

contemporaries. The fearful profligacy which his powerful pen describes

in such hideous terms spread through Rome its loathsome infection. As no

language is strong enough to denounce the impurities of his

age—impurities, in the description of which, the poet evidently revels

with a cynical delight—so they were not merely creatures of a prurient

imagination, but had a real existence.

It may be said in extenuation of his crime, that the prevalence of vice

produced the obscenity of the poet; but no more can be said in defence

of works in which the characters of vice are emblazoned in such

shameless and unnatural deformity. Had he lived in better times, his

talents, of which no doubt can be entertained, might have been devoted

to a purer object; as it was, his moral taste must have been thoroughly

depraved not to have turned with loathing and disgust from the

contemplation of such subjects, instead of voluntarily seeking them; for

“out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” In Martial we

observe that paradoxical but still not unusual combination of varied

wit, poetical imagination, and a happy power of graceful expression, not

only with strong sensual passions, but with a delight in vice in its

most hateful forms and attributes.

Although the new feature which Martial added to the Greek epigram is

such as has been described, and although his pages are polluted and

defiled, not all his poems are spiteful or obscene. Amidst some

obscurity of style and want of finish, many are redolent of Greek

sweetness and elegance. Here and there are pleasing descriptions of the

beauties of nature;[1173] and, setting aside those which are evidently

dictated by the spirit of flattery, many are kind-hearted, as well as

complimentary. The few lines which were intended to accompany such

trifling offerings of friendship as the poet could afford to give, and

which, doubtless, rendered a flower or a toy doubly acceptable, are

equal in neatness to many of the Greek Anthology. When he sends a rose

to Apollinaris, it is accompanied by the following elegant lines:—

I felix rosa, mollibusque sertis

Nostri cinge comas Apollinaris;

Quas tu nectere candidas sed olim,

Sic te semper amet Venus, memento.[1174]

Go, happy rose, and with thy delicate garlands wreathe the locks of my

Apollinaris; and remember, so may Venus ever love thee! to entwine

them when gray: but may it be long ere that time comes.

The fourteenth book contains numerous ingenious couplets, sent, together

with pencases, dice, tablets, toothpicks, and other little presents, at

the Saturnalian festival.

In so vast a collection of pieces it is natural to expect that there

would be great inequality, and that some of his wit would be commonplace

and puerile. That such was the case, he himself confesses more than

once;[1175] and in one place he states that this inequality constitutes

one of the merits of his work.[1176]

He knew that his works were appreciated, not only at Rome, but also

throughout the empire:—

Toto notus in orbe Martialis

Argutis epigrammaton libellis;[1177]

and this consciousness is some excuse for the vanity which occasionally

shows itself,[1178] and which does not hesitate to account blemishes as

beauties.

The following are favourable specimens of his poetry:—

Indignas premeret pestis cum tabida fauces,

Inque ipsos vultus serperet atra lues;

Siccis ipse genis flentes hortatus amicos

Decrevit Stygios Festus adire lacus.

Nec tamen obscuro pia polluit ora veneno,

Aut torsit lenta tristia fata fame;

Sanctam Romana vitam sed morte peregit,

Dimisitque animam nobiliore via.

Hanc mortem fatis magni præferre Catonis

Fama potest; hujus Cæsar amicus erat.

When the dire quinsey choked his noble breath,

And o’er his face the blackening venom stole,

Festus disdained to wait a lingering death,

Cheered his sad friends, and freed his dauntless soul.

Nor meager famine’s slowly-wasting force,

Nor hemlock’s gradual chillness he endured;

But closed his life a truly Roman course,

And with one blow his liberty secured.

The Fates gave Cato a less glorious end,

For Cæsar was his foe, Festus was Cæsar’s friend.[1179]

_Hodgson._

Casta suo gladium cum traderet Arria Pæto

Quem de visceribus traxerat ipsa suis,

Si qua fides, vulnus, quod feci, non dolet, inquit;

Sed quod tu facies, hoc mihi, Pæte, dolet.

When Arria to her Pætus gave the steel,

Which from her bleeding side did newly part;

“From my own stroke,” she said, “no pain I feel,

But, ah! thy wound will stab me to the heart.”

Dum nos blanda tenent jucundi stagna Lucrini

Et quæ pumiceis fontibus antra calent,

Tu colis Argivi regnum Faustine coloni

Quo te bis decimus ducit ab urbe lapis.

Horrida sed fervent Nemeæi pectora monstri

Nec satis est Baias igne calere suo.

Ergo sacri fontes et littora sacra valete

Nympharum pariter Nereidumque domus!

Herculeos colles gelida vos vincite bruma,

Nunc Tiburtinis cedite frigoribus.

While near the Lucrine lake, consumed to death,

I draw the sultry air and gasp for breath,

Where streams of sulphur raise a stifling heat,

And thro’ the pores of the warm pumice sweat;

You taste the cooling breeze where, nearer home,

The twentieth pillar marks the mile from Rome.

And now the Sun to the bright Lion turns,

And Baia with redoubled fury burns;

Then briny seas and tasteful springs, farewell,

Where fountain Nymphs confused with Naiads dwell.

In winter you may all the world despise,

But now ’tis Tivoli that bears the prize.

_Addison._

CHAPTER VI.

AUFIDIUS BASSUS AND CREMUTIUS CORDUS—VELLEIUS PATERCULUS—CHARACTER OF

HIS WORKS—VALERIUS MAXIMUS—CORNELIUS TACITUS—AGE OF TRAJAN—BIOGRAPHY OF

TACITUS—HIS EXTANT WORKS

ENUMERATED—AGRICOLA—GERMANY—HISTORIES—TRADITIONS RESPECTING THE

JEWS—ANNALS—OBJECT OF TACITUS—HIS CHARACTER—HIS STYLE.

The earliest prose writers belonging to this epoch were Aufidius Bassus

and Cremutius Cordus. The former wrote a history of the German and civil

wars, which was continued by the elder Pliny; of the latter only a few

fragments have been preserved by Seneca.[1180] They were published in

the reign of Tiberius; and it is evident that they contained a history

of the civil wars, for his praise of Brutus and Cassius was made the

pretext for his impeachment. It is also clear that he treated of

contemporary events; for the real cause of the emperor’s hostility was

an attack which he made upon the favourite Sejanus. In vain he tendered

an apology; and seeing there was no hope of escape he starved himself to

death.[1181] His histories were publicly burned, but his daughter, to

whom Seneca addressed his “_Consolatio_,” concealed some copies, and

afterwards published them, with the approbation of Caligula.[1182]

M. VELLEIUS PATERCULUS.

Together with these flourished M. Velleius Paterculus. He was a soldier

of equestrian family, served his first campaign in Asia, and

subsequently, after passing through the various steps of promotion,

acted as _legatus_ to Tiberius in Germany. His services recommended him

to the favour of the prince, on whose accession he was made prætor, and

proved himself a stanch supporter of him and his favourite minister

Sejanus. In the fall of that unworthy man,[1183] Paterculus was

involved, and was most probably put to death.

The short historical work by which he is known as an author is a history

of Rome, and of the nations connected with the foundation of the

imperial city, in two books. It is dedicated to M. Vinucius, consul; and

as it carries on the history to the death of Livia, the mother of

Tiberius, in the year of his consulate,[1184] it must have been

finished, perhaps almost entirely written within that year. Assuming

that it was wise to undertake the task of comprising within such narrow

limits events extending over so large a field, it is not unskilfully

performed. The most striking events are selected and told in a lively

and interesting manner; but he had one fault fatal to his character as

an historian, who professed to treat of his own times. He is partial,

prejudiced, and adulatory. He had not courage to be a Thucydides or a

Sallust. The perilous nature of the times, and the personal obligations

under which he was to the emperor, made him a courtier, and from this

one-sided point of view he viewed contemporary history.

He was, however, a man of lively talents though of superficial

education: his taste was formed after the model of the Augustan writers,

especially Sallust, of whose style, so far as the outward form, he was

an imitator. But although he was one of the earliest writers of the so

called silver age, his language shows signs of degeneracy. It is, at

times, overstrained and unnatural; there is the usual affectation of

rhetorical effect, and an unnecessary use of uncommon words and

constructions; still, whenever he keeps his model in view, he is

scarcely inferior to him in conciseness and perspicuity. The first book

of his history is in a very imperfect state; in fact, the commencement

is entirely lost. Only one manuscript of it has been discovered, and

even this is now nowhere to be found.

VALERIUS MAXIMUS.

Valerius Maximus can scarcely be termed an historian, although the

subject of which he treated is historical. His work is neither one of

original research, nor is it a connected abridgment of the investigation

of his predecessors. It is a collection of anecdotes, entitled _Dictorum

Factorumque Memorabilium_, Libri IX. His object is a moral one; namely,

to illustrate, by examples, the beauty of virtue and the deformity of

vice; but he is influenced in the selection less by historical truth

than by the striking and interesting character of the narrative. The

arrangement of the anecdotes resembles that of a commonplace book,

rather than of history, the only principle observed being, that

anecdotes of Romans and foreigners are kept distinct from one another.

Nothing is known, for certain, respecting his personal history. He

himself states[1185] that he accompanied Sextus Pompeius into Asia; and,

from a comparison of different passages, it is probable that, like

Velleius Paterculus, he flourished and wrote during the reign of

Tiberius. His style is prolix and declamatory, and characterized by

awkward affectation and involved obscurity.

C. CORNELIUS TACITUS.

For the reasons already stated, Rome, for a long period, could boast of

no historian; but, under the genial and fostering influence of the

Emperor Trajan,[1186] not only the fine arts, especially architecture,

flourished, but also literature revived. The choice of Nerva could not

have fallen on a better successor to his short reign. He was a Spaniard,

but his native town was a flourishing Roman colony: the whole country

round about it had experienced the effects of Roman civilization, and

the language of all the towns in the south of Spain was Latin. The

glories of war and the duties of peace divided his attention. By the

former, he gave employment to his vast armies; by the latter he refined

the tastes and improved the character of his people. No better testimony

can be desired than the correspondence between him and Pliny to the

mildness and wisdom of his domestic and foreign administration. The

influence, also, of his empress, Plotina, and his sister, Marciana,

exercised a beneficial influence upon Roman society; for they were the

first ladies of the imperial court who by their example checked the

shameless licentiousness which had long prevailed amongst women of the

higher classes. The same taste and execution which are visible in the

bas-reliefs on the column of Trajan adorn the literature of his age, as

illustrated by its two great lights, Tacitus and the younger Pliny.

There is not the rich, graceful ornament which invests with such a charm

the writers of the golden age; but the absence of these qualities is

amply compensated by dignity, gravity, honesty and truthfulness. There

is a solidity in the style of Tacitus which makes amends for its

difficulty, and justifies the intense admiration with which he was

regarded by Pliny. Truthfulness beams throughout the writings of these

two great contemporaries; and incorruptible virtue is as visible in the

pages of Tacitus as benevolence is in the letters of Pliny. They

mutually influenced each other’s character and principles: their tastes

and pursuits were similar: they loved each other dearly; corresponded

regularly, corrected each other’s works, and accepted patiently and

gratefully each other’s criticisms. If, however, on all occasions, their

observations were such as appear in the letters of Pliny, it is probable

that their mutual regard, and the unbounded admiration which Pliny

entertained for the superior genius of his friend caused them to be

rather laudatory than severe.

The exact date of the birth of Tacitus is not known; but from one of the

many letters extant, addressed to him by Pliny,[1187] it may be inferred

that the former was not more than one or two years senior to his friend.

In it he reminds him that in years they are almost equals, and adds that

he himself was a young man when Tacitus had already obtained a brilliant

reputation. There is a tradition which assigns the birth of Tacitus to

the year of Nero’s accession; but as Pliny the Younger was born A. D.

61, and Nero assumed the imperial purple A. D. 54, this date would make

the difference in age between him and Pliny too great to be consistent

with the expressions of the latter. Tacitus was of equestrian rank, and

was procurator of Belgic Gaul in the reigns of Vespasian and Titus, from

whom, as well as from Domitian, he received many marks of esteem. In

A. D. 78, he married the daughter of C. Julius Agricola. He was one of

the fifteen commissioners appointed for the celebration of the Ludi

Seculares, A. D. 88, and was also prætor the same year. In A. D. 97, he

served the office of consul. To this magistracy he was elected in order

to supply the place of Virginius Rufus, who had died during his year of

office, and over him Tacitus pronounced the funeral oration. In A. D.

99, he was associated by the Senate with Pliny[1188] in the impeachment

of Marius Priscus, proconsul of Africa, for maladministration of his

province; and his friend Pliny praises his reply to the acute subtleties

of Salvius Liberalis, the advocate of Marius, as distinguished, not only

for oratorical power, but for that which he considers the most

remarkable quality of his style, _gravity_. His words are, “Respondit

Corn. Tacitus eloquentissime et quod eximie orationi ejus inest,

σεμνως.”[1189] It is not known when Tacitus died, nor whether he left

any descendants; but there can be no doubt that he survived the

accession of Hadrian.[1190]

The works of Tacitus which are extant, are:—(1.) A Life of his

father-in-law, Agricola. (2.) A tract on the Manners and Nations of

Germany. (3.) A small portion of a voluminous work, entitled Histories.

(4.) About two-thirds of another historical work, entitled Annals. (5.)

A dialogue on the Decline of Eloquence is also ascribed to him; and

although doubts have been entertained of its genuineness, they do not

rest upon any strong foundation. It is impossible to do more than

approximate to the dates at which each work of Tacitus was composed. The

imminent peril of writing or speaking plainly on events or individuals

renders it almost certain that none of them could have been published

before the accession of Trajan. Niebuhr[1191] entertains no doubt that

the first edition of the Life of Agricola was published towards the end

of Domitian’s reign, and that, subsequently, it was revised and an

introduction prefixed. But is it not more probable that, although the

work was then written, it was not published until after revision?

Great as were the moral worth and the amiable gentleness of Agricola,

his courage as a soldier, his skill and decision as a general, his

prudence and caution as a politician, and, therefore, however deserving

he may be of the pleasing light in which his character is portrayed,

still the life of Tacitus is a panegyric rather than a biography. The

near relation in which Tacitus stood to him, the affectionate admiration

which Agricola must necessarily have commanded from one who knew him so

well, unfitted him for the work of an impartial biographer. The fine

points of Agricola’s character outshine all its other features; but we

cannot suppose that he had no defects, no weaknesses. These, however, do

not appear in the little work of Tacitus. His son-in-law either could

not or would not see them. Still the brief sketch is a beautiful

specimen of the vigour and force of expression with which this greatest

painter of antiquity could throw off any portrait which he attempted.

Even if the likeness be somewhat flattered, the qualities which the

writer possessed, his insight into character, his pathetic power, and

his affectionate heart, render this short piece one of the most

attractive biographies extant.[1192]

With what simple pathos does he tell us of the obligation which

Agricola, like so many other great men, owed to the educating care of

his pure-minded, prudent, and indulgent mother, and the gratitude with

which he was wont constantly to speak of that obligation! With what

affection does he speak of one bound to him, not only by the ties of

affinity, but by the stronger ties of a congenial temper and

disposition! In his reflections on his death, there is no affected

attempt at dramatic display. The few words devoted to so mournful a

subject simply breathe the overwhelming sense of bereavement, unassuaged

by the consolation of being present at his last moments. “Happy wert

thou, Agricola, not only because thy life was glorious, but because thy

death was well-timed! All who heard thy last words bear witness to the

constancy with which thou didst welcome death as though thou wert

determined manfully to acquit the emperor of being the cause. But the

bitterness of thy daughter’s sorrow and mine for the loss of a parent is

enhanced by the reflection, that it did not fall to our lot to watch

over thy declining health, to solace thy failing strength, to enjoy thy

last looks, thy last embraces. Faithfully would we have listened to thy

parting words and wishes, and imprinted them deeply on our memories.

This was our chief sorrow, our most painful wound. Owing to our long

absence from Rome, thou hadst been lost to us four years before.

Doubtless, O best of parents! enough, and more than enough, of honour

was paid to thee by the assiduous attention of thy affectionate wife;

still the last offices were paid thee amidst too few tears, and thine

eyes were conscious that some loved object was absent just as their

light was dimmed for ever.” To this tribute of dutiful affection,

succeed sentiments of noble resignation, joined with an humble

conviction of the transitory nature of human talents, and an earnest

looking-for of immortality. To us, the biography of Agricola is

especially interesting, because Britain was the scene of his glory as a

military commander, and of his success in civil administration. His army

first penetrated beyond the Friths of Forth and Clyde into the Highlands

of Scotland, and his fleet first circumnavigated the northern

extremities of the British island.

The treatise on the geography, manners and nations of Germany (_De Situ

Moribus et Populus Germaniæ_) is but little longer than the Life of

Agricola. The information contained in it is exactly of that character

which might be expected, considering the sources from which it was

derived. Tacitus was never in Germany, and therefore his knowledge was

collected from those who had visited it for the purposes either of war

or commerce. Hence his geographical descriptions are often vague and

inaccurate; a mixture of the marvellous shows that some of his

narratives consist in mere travellers’ tales, whilst the salient points

and characteristic features of the national manners bear the impress of

truth, and are supported by the well-known habits and institutions of

Teutonic nations.

He tells of their bards, and explains the etymology of the term by the

word Barditum, which signified the recitation of their songs.[1193] He

hints at wild legends and dark superstitions with which the German

imagination still loves to people the dark recesses of their

forests.[1194] He describes their pure and unmixed race, and,

consequently, the universal prevalence of the national features—blue

eyes, red or sandy hair, and stalwart and gigantic frames.[1195]

According to his account, their political constitutions were elective

monarchies, but the monarch was always of noble birth and his power

limited;[1196] and all matters of importance were debated by the estate

of the people.[1197] In the solemn permission accorded to a German youth

to bear arms, and his investiture with lance and shield, is seen the

origin of knighthood;[1198] and in the sanctity of the marriage-tie, the

chastity of the female sex, their social influence, and the respect paid

to them—the rarity of adultery and its severe punishment, and the total

absence of polygamy—we recognise the germ of the distinguishing

characteristics of chivalry.[1199] They were hospitable and constant to

their hereditary friendships, but stern in perpetuating family

feuds;[1200] passionately fond of gambling, and strict in their regard

for debts of honour;[1201] inveterate drinkers, and their favourite

potation was beer;[1202] they could not consult on important matters

without a convivial meeting;[1203] if they quarrelled over their cups,

they had recourse rarely to words, usually to blows.[1204] Their slaves

were in the condition of serfs or villains, and paid to the lord a fixed

rent in corn, or cattle, or manufactures.[1205] They reckoned their time

by nights instead of days,[1206] just as we are accustomed to use the

expressions se’nnight and fortnight.

After having sketched the manners and customs of the nation as a whole

he proceeds to treat of each tribe separately.[1207] In speaking of our

forefathers, the _Angli_, who inhabited part of the modern territory of

Sleswick Holstein, and whose name is still retained in the district of

Angeln, one word which he uses is an English one. The Angli, he says,

together with the conterminous tribes, worship Herthus, _i. e._

Terra.[1208] Even in these early times he mentions the naval superiority

of the Suiones, who were the ancestors of the Normans and Sea-kings.

With these he affirms that the continent of Europe terminates, and all

beyond is a motionless and frozen ocean.[1209] Truth in these distant

climes mingles with fable. Daylight continues after the sun has set, but

a hissing noise is heard as his blazing orb plunges into the sea, and

the forms of the gods, and the radiant glories which surround their

heads, are visible.[1210] The list of marvels ends with fabulous beings,

whose bodies and limbs are those of wild beasts, whilst their heads and

faces are human.

The earliest historical work of Tacitus is his “_Historiæ_,” of which

only four books and a portion of the fifth are extant. Their contents

extend from the second consulship of Galba[1211] to the commencement of

the siege of Jerusalem. The original work concluded with the death of

Domitian.[1212] He purposed also, if his life had been spared, to add

the reigns of Nerva and Trajan, as the employment of his old age. “The

materials for which,” he says, “are more plentiful and trustworthy,

because of the unusual felicity of an age in which men were allowed to

think as they pleased, and to give utterance to what they

thought.”[1213] It is plain from the word Divus (the deified) being

prefixed to the name of Nerva, and not to that of Trajan, in the passage

above quoted, that this work was written after Trajan had put on the

imperial purple.[1214]

According to St. Jerome it originally consisted of thirty books; and the

minuteness with which each event is recorded in the portion extant

renders it highly probable that the original work was as extensive as

this assertion would imply. The object which he proposed to himself was

worthy of his penetrating mind, from the searching gaze of which even

the hypocrisy and dissimulation of a Tiberius were powerless to veil the

foul darkness of his crafty nature. He intended “to investigate the

political state of the commonwealth, the feelings of its armies, the

sentiments of the provinces, the elements of its strength and weakness,

the causes and reasons for each phænomenon.”[1215] The principal fault

which diminishes the value of his history as a record of events, is his

too great readiness to accept evidence unhesitatingly, and to record

popular rumours without taking sufficient pains to examine into their

truth. Still these blots are but few, scattered over a vast field of

faithful history. Perhaps the most lamentable instance is presented in

his incorrect account of the history, constitution, and manners of the

Jewish people. Wanting either the opportunity or the inclination to

consult the sacred books of the nation, he mixes up vague traditions of

their early history with the fables of Pagan mythology; and, like the

Greeks and Romans, gives names to imaginary patriarchs, taken from

localities connected with their history.

According to his account the Jews originally inhabited Crete,[1216] and

from Mount Ida, in that Island, received the name of Idæi, which

afterwards became corrupted into Judæi. From Crete, when Saturn was

expelled by Jove, they took refuge in Egypt; and thence under two

leaders, Juda and Hierosolymus, again migrated to the neighbouring

country of Palestine. A second tradition attributes to them an Assyrian

origin; a third an Æthiopian; a fourth asserts that they were descended

from the Solymi which Homer celebrated in his poems.[1217]

The next tradition which he mentions approaches nearer to the true one.

Egypt being afflicted with a plague, the king Bocchoris, by the advice

of the oracle of Ammon, purged his kingdom of them, and under the

guidance of Moses they began their wanderings. When they were dying on

their way for want of water, their leader followed a herd of wild asses,

by which he was led to a copious well of water. Thus was their drought

relieved; and, after journeying six days, they obtained possession of

the land in which they built their capital and temple. Moses introduced

new religious rites contrary to those of other nations. He set up the

image of an ass in the Holy of Holies—a statement which afterwards

Tacitus virtually contradicts by saying that they allow no images in

their temples,[1218] that they preferred taking up arms to admitting the

statue of Caligula into the temple;[1219] and that when Pompey took

Jerusalem,[1220] he found no image of any deity, and the sanctuary

empty. He adds, that they sacrifice rams in order to show contempt to

Jupiter Ammon, and oxen, because, under that form, Apis was worshipped

by the Egyptians; that they abstain from pork in remembrance of their

having been afflicted with leprosy, to which that animal is subject, and

eat unleavened bread as a memorial of their once having stolen food. On

the seventh day, which terminated their wanderings, they do no work, and

in like manner the seventh year they devote to idleness. This Sabbath,

some assert that they keep holy in honour of Saturn. They believe in the

immortality of the soul, and in future rewards and punishments, and

embalm their dead like the Egyptians. Such are the various traditions

respecting the Jews which Tacitus incorporates in his Histories.

The Annals, which were written subsequently to the Histories, were so

called, because each historical event is recorded in historical order

under the year to which it belongs.[1221] They consist of sixteen books;

commence with the death of Augustus,[1222] and conclude with that of

Nero.[1223] The only portions extant are—the first four books, part of

the fifth, the sixth, part of the eleventh, the twelfth, thirteenth,

fourteenth, fifteenth, and the commencement of the sixteenth book. The

Annals are rather histories of each successive emperor than of the Roman

people; but this is the necessary condition of narrating the fortunes of

a nation which now possessed only the bare name, and not the reality of

constitutional government. The state was now the emperor; the end and

object of the social system his security; and every political event must

therefore be treated in relation to him.

But a history of this kind in the hands of one who had such skill in

diving into the recesses of man’s heart, who could read so shrewdly and

delineate so vigorously human character, who possessed as a writer such

picturesque and dramatic power, becomes the more interesting from its

biographical nature, and its philosophical importance as a moral rather

than a political study. It is not, owing to circumstances over which the

author had no control, the history of a great nation, for the Romans, as

a whole, were no longer great. Neither does it paint the rise, progress

and development of constitutional freedom, for it had reached its

zenith, had declined, become paralyzed, and finally extinct. But still

there existed bright examples of heroism, and courage, and

self-devotion, truly Roman, and instances not less prominent of

corruption and degradation. Individuals stand out in bold relief,

eminent for the noblest virtues or blackened by the basest crimes. These

appear either singly or in groups upon the stage: the emperor forms the

principal figure; and the moral sense of the reader is awakened to

admire instances of patient suffering and determined bravery, or abject

slavery and remorseless despotism.

The object of Tacitus, therefore, was not, like that of the great

philosophical historian of Greece, to describe the growth of political

institutions, or the implacable animosities which raged between opposite

political principles—the struggles for supremacy between a class and a

whole people—but the influence which the establishment of tyranny on the

ruins of liberty exercised for good or for evil in bringing out the

character of the individual. Rome, the imperial city, was the

all-engrossing subject of his predecessors; Romans were but subordinate

and accessary. Tacitus delineated the lives and deaths of individuals,

and showed the relation which they bore to the fortunes of their

country.

It would have been impossible to have satisfied a people whose taste had

become more than ever rhetorical, without the introduction of orations.

Those of Tacitus are perfect specimens of art; and probably, with the

exception of Galgacus,[1224] far more true than those of other Roman

historians. Still he made use of them, not only to imbody traditional

accounts of what had really been said on each occasion, but to

illustrate his own views of the character of the speaker, and to convey

his own political opinions.

Full of sagacious observation and descriptive power, Tacitus engages the

most serious attention of the reader by the gravity of his condensed and

comprehensive style, as he does by the wisdom and dignity of his

reflections. The purity and gravity of his sentiments remind the reader

even of Christian authors.

Living amidst the influences of a corrupt age he was uncontaminated; and

by his virtue and integrity, his chastened political liberality,

commands our admiration as a man, whilst his love of truth is reflected

in his character as an historian. Although he imitated, as well as

approved, the cautious policy of his father-in-law, he was not destitute

of moral firmness.

It derogates nothing from his courage that he was silent during the

perilous times in which great part of his life was passed, and spoke

with boldness only when the happy reign of Nerva had commenced, and the

broken spirit of the nation had revived. Like the rest of his

fellow-countrymen he exhibited a remarkable example of patient

endurance, when the imperial jealousy made even the praise of those who

were obnoxious to the tyrant treason; when it was considered a capital

crime for Arulenus Rusticus to praise Pætus Thrasea, and Herennius

Senecio to eulogize Priscus Helvidius.

In those fearful times he himself says, that “as old Rome had witnessed

the greatest glories of liberty, so her descendants had been cast down

to the lowest depths of slavery; and would have been deprived of the use

of memory, as well as of language, if it were equally in man’s power to

forget as to be silent.”[1225] In such times prudence was a duty, and

daring courage would have been unavailing rashness. In his praise of

Agricola, and his blame of Pætus, he enunciates the principles which

regulate his own conduct—that to endanger yourself without the slightest

prospect of benefiting your country is mere ostentatious ambition.

“Sciant,” he writes, “quibus moris illicita mirari, posse etiam sub

malis principibus magnos viros esse; obsequiumque ac modestiam, si

industria ac vigor adsint, eo laudis excedere quo plerique per abrupta,

sed in nullum reipublicæ usum ambitiosa morte inclaruerunt.”[1226]

Again, “Thrasea Pætus sibi causam periculi fecit, cæteris libertatis

initium non præbuit.”[1227]

In the style of Tacitus the form is always subordinate to the matter;

the ideas maintain their due supremacy over the language in which they

are conveyed. There is none of that striving after epigrammatic

terseness which savours of affectation. His brevity, like that which

characterizes the style of Thucydides, is the necessary condensation of

a writer whose thoughts flow more quickly than his pen can express them.

Hence his sentences are suggestive of far more than they express: they

are enigmatical hints of deep and hidden meaning, which keep the mind

active and the attention alive, and delight the reader with the

pleasures of discovery and the consciousness of difficulties overcome.

Nor is this natural and unintentional brevity unsuitable to the cautious

reserve with which all were tutored to speak and think of political

subjects in perilous times. It is extraordinary how often a similarity

between his mind and that of Thucydides inadvertently discovers

itself—not only in his mode of thinking, but also in his language, even

in his grammatical constructions, especially in his frequent

substitution of attraction for government, in instances of condensed

construction, and in the connexion of clauses grammatically different,

although they are metaphysically the same.

Nor is his brevity dry or harsh—it is enlivened by copiousness, variety,

and poetry. He scarcely ever repeats the same idea in the same form. No

author is richer in synonymous words, or arranges with more varied skill

the position of words in a sentence. As for poetic genius, his language

is highly figurative; no prose writer deals more largely in prosopopœia:

his descriptions of scenery and incidents are eminently picturesque; his

characters dramatic; the expression of his own sentiments and feelings

as subjective as lyric poetry.

CHAPTER VII.

C. SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS—HIS BIOGRAPHY—SOURCES OF HIS HISTORY—HIS GREAT

FAULT—Q. CURTIUS RUFUS—TIME WHEN HE FLOURISHED DOUBTFUL—HIS BIOGRAPHY OF

ALEXANDER—EPITOMES OF L. ANNÆUS FLORUS—SOURCES WHENCE HE DERIVED THEM.

C. SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS.

C. Suetonius Tranquillus[1228] was the son of Suetonius Lenis, who

served as tribunus angusticlavus of the thirteenth legion at the battle

of Bedriacum, in which the Emperor Otho was defeated by Vitellius. The

time of his birth is uncertain; but from a passage at the end of his

Life of Nero[1229] it may be inferred that he was born very soon after

the death of that emperor, which took place A. D. 68; for in it he

mentions that, when twenty years subsequent to Nero’s death, a false

Nero appeared, he was just arriving at manhood (_adolescens_.) The

knowledge of language and rhetorical taste displayed in the remains of

his works on these subjects prove that he was well instructed in these

branches of a Roman liberal education: and a letter of the younger

Pliny,[1230] whose intimate friend he was, speaks of him as an advocate

by profession. This letter represents him as unwilling to plead a cause,

which he had undertaken, because he was frightened by a dream. It is

probable that this anecdote is an authentic one, because so many

examples occur in his memoirs of his superstitious belief in dreams,

omens, ghosts, and prodigies.[1231]

The affectionate regard which Pliny entertained for his friend was very

great, and led him to form too high an estimate of his talents as a

writer and an historian. On one occasion he used his influence at court

to get him a tribuneship; which, however, he did not accept.[1232] On

another he obtained for him, from Trajan,[1233] the “_jus trium

liberorum_,” although he had no children. But this privilege, as in the

case of Martial, was sometimes granted under similar circumstances. In

this letter, which he wrote to the Emperor, he speaks of Suetonius as a

man of the greatest probity, integrity, and learning; and adds that,

after the experience of a long acquaintance, the more he knows of him

the more he loves him.

Subsequently Suetonius became private secretary (_Magister Epistolarum_)

to Hadrian,[1234] but was deprived of the situation. Owing to the only

sources of information respecting Suetonius being his own works, and the

few scattered notices in the letters of Plinius Secundus, nothing more

is known respecting his life.

A catalogue of his numerous writings is given by Suidas:[1235] but, with

the exception of the Lives of the Twelve Cæsars, it does not contain his

chief extant works. These are notices of illustrious grammarians and

rhetoricians, and the lives of the poets Terence, Horace, Persius,

Lucan, and Juvenal.

Niebuhr[1236] believed that the history, or rather the biography of the

Cæsars was written when Suetonius was still young, before he was

secretary to Hadrian, and previous to the publication of the Histories

of Tacitus. If so, he neither enjoyed the opportunities of consulting

the imperial records which his situation at court would have given him,

nor of profiting by the accurate guidance and profound reflection of

Tacitus. Krause,[1237] on the other hand, adduces many parallelisms

between the language of Tacitus and Suetonius; and as Tacitus did not

publish his earliest historical work before A. D. 117,[1238] assumes

that Suetonius did not write his biographies until after the accession

of Hadrian.

It is very difficult to determine which of these theories is the correct

one; but there can be no doubt that the sources from which he derived

his information are quite independent of the authority of Tacitus; and

that the Lives of the Twelve Cæsars would have contained all that we

find in them, even if the Annals and Histories had never been written.

He does not only trust to the works of the Roman historians, but his

exact quotations from acts of the senate and people, edicts, fasti, and

orations, and the use which he makes of annals and inscriptions, prove

that he was a man of diligent research, and that he examined original

documents for himself.

Again, as a writer of biographical memoirs rather than of regular

history, and fond of anecdote and scandal, he availed himself largely of

such private letters of Emperors and their dependants as fell in his

way, of testamentary documents, and of the information he could collect

in conversation. Many of the lives which he wrote were those of his

contemporaries. Some of the events recorded were passing under the eyes

of the public, and were matters of notoriety. He himself asserts in

three several places[1239] that he received some of the accounts which

he gives from the testimony of eye-witnesses. The more secret habits of

the Emperors, either truly told or exaggerated by an appetite for

scandal, would ooze out. Anecdotes of the reigning Emperor’s private

life would be eagerly sought for, and be the favourite topic of gossip

in all circles of Roman society. Nor would he have any difficulty in

procuring copious stores of information respecting those Emperors who

reigned before he was born from those of his contemporaries who were a

generation older than himself, and who were spectators of, or actors in,

many of the scenes which he describes. As a biographer, there is no

reason to doubt his honesty and veracity; he is industrious and careful;

he indulges neither in ornament of style nor in romantic exaggeration;

the picture which he draws is a terrible one, but it is fully supported

by the contemporary authority of Juvenal and Tacitus. Nevertheless, his

mind was not of that comprehensive and philosophical character which

would qualify him for taking an enlarged view of political affairs, or

for the work of an historian. He has no definite plan formed in his

mind, without which an historian can never hope to make his work a

complete whole; he wanders at will from one subject to another, just as

the idea seizes him, and is by no means careful of committing offences

against chronological order.

Niebuhr accuses him of inconsistency in the character which he draws and

the praise which he bestows on Vespasian:[1240] but adds what may, in

some sort, be considered a defence, namely, that Vespasian was,

negatively speaking, a good, upright, and just man, and that the dark

side of his character must be considered in reference to the fearful

times in which he reigned. He also mentions, as an example of his

deficiencies as an historian, the bad accounts which he has left of his

own times, especially of the anarchy which followed Nero’s death, and

the commencement of the reign of Vespasian. But in his praise it may be

said that Suetonius has formed a just estimate of his own powers in

undertaking to be a biographer and not an historian; and it is scarcely

fair to criticise severely his unfitness for a task to which he made no

pretensions.

One great fault pollutes his pages. The dark pictures which he draws of

the most profligate Emperors, the disgusting annals of their unheard-of

crimes, are dwelt upon as though he took pleasure in the description,

and loved to wallow in the mire of the foulest debauchery. Truth,

perhaps, required that they should not have been passed over in silence,

but they might have been lightly touched, and not painted in detail with

revolting faithfulness. He is often brief, sometimes obscure: in such

passages of his narrative we would have gladly welcomed both brevity and

obscurity.

Q. CURTIUS RUFUS.

The doubts which have always been entertained respecting the time when

the biographer of Alexander the Great flourished, and which no

investigations have been sufficient to dissipate, render it impossible

to pass him by unnoticed, although he may, perhaps, belong to an age

beyond the chronological limits of this work. The purity of his style

has, in the opinion of some critics, entitled him to a place among the

writers of the silver age; whilst Niebuhr, judging by the internal

evidence, thinks that he must have lived as late as the reign of

Caracalla or Septimius Severus.

No valid argument, however, can be based upon his style, because it is

evidently artificial: it is, indeed, infected with a love of declamatory

ornament; it is sometimes more like poetry than prose; it abounds in

metaphors, and therefore proves that he lived in a rhetorical age; but

it is upon the whole an imitation of the Latinity of Livy. This

rhetorical character of his style gives some value to the opinion of F.

A. Wolf, that he was the Q. Curtius Rufus mentioned by Suetonius in his

treatise on Illustrious Orators. If so, he was probably a contemporary.

With respect to internal evidence, reference has been made to two

passages as containing allusions to his times. (1.) Multis ergo casibus

defuncta (sc. Tyrus,) nunc tamen longa pace cuncta refovente, sub tutela

Romanæ mansuetudinis acquiescit.[1241] (2.) Proinde jure meritoque P. R.

salutem se principi suo debere profitetur, qui noctis, quam pæne

supremam habuimus, novum sidus illuxit, hujus hercule, non solis ortus,

lucem caliganti reddidit mundo, cum sine suo capite discordia membra

trepidarent.[1242] The former has been considered descriptive of many

periods in Roman history: although Niebuhr[1243] makes the unqualified

assertion, that it has no meaning, unless it alludes to the times of

Septimius Severus and Caracalla. The latter is equally vague: Niebuhr

thinks it might refer to Aurelian: Gibbon considers that it alluded to

Gordian. But to how many Emperors might a spirit of eulogistic flattery

make it applicable! Upon the whole, it is most probable that he lived

towards the close of the first century.

The biography of Alexander is deeply interesting; for, although Curtius

evidently disdains historic reality, his hero always seems to have a

living existence: it is a romance rather than a history. He never loses

an opportunity by the colouring which he gives to historical facts of

elevating the Macedonian conqueror to a superhuman standard. He has no

inclination to weigh the merits of conflicting historical testimonies:

he selects that which supports his partial predilections; nor are his

talents for story-telling checked by a profound knowledge of either

tactics or geography, or other objective historical materials, for

correct details in which he is too frequently negligent.[1244] His

florid and ornamented style is suitable to the imaginary orations which

are introduced in the narrative, and which constitute the most striking

portions of the work. The sources from which he derived his information

are various, the principal one being the account of Alexander’s exploits

by the Greek historian Clitarchus, who accompanied the Macedonian

conqueror in his Asiatic expedition. He is, however, by no means a

servile follower; for in one instance he does not hesitate to accuse him

of inaccuracy. They were, however, kindred spirits: both would sacrifice

truth to romantic interest; both indulged in the same tale-telling

tendency. His work originally consisted of ten books. Two of these are

lost, and their places have been supplied, in a very inferior manner, by

Cellarius and Freinsheim. Even in the eight books which are extant, an

hiatus of more or less extent occasionally occurs.

L. ANNÆUS FLORUS.

Brief as the epitomes are which bear the name of L. Annæus Florus, the

style is characterized by the rhetorical spirit of the age to which they

belong. They are diffuse and declamatory, and their author is rather the

panegyrist of his countrymen than the grave and sober narrator of the

most important events contained in their history. This short summary,

entitled “_Rerum Romanarum_, Libri IV.,” or “_Epitome de Gestis

Romanorum_,” is a well-arranged compilation from the authorities extant;

but it is probable that, like all other Roman historians except Velleius

Paterculus, he derived his materials principally from Livy. Such a dry

skeleton of history, however, must be uninteresting. Who the author was

is by no means certain. Some have supposed him to be the same with

Annæus Florus, who wrote three trochaic verses to Hadrian. Titze[1245]

imagines that it is the work of two authors, one a contemporary of

Horace,[1246] the other belonging to a later literary period.

It is generally assumed that the author[1247] of the Epitomes was either

a Spaniard or a Gaul; and, if we may consider the introduction to the

work as genuine, he lived in the reign of Trajan.

CHAPTER VIII.

M. ANNÆUS SENECA—HIS CONTROVERSY AND SUASORIÆ—L. ANNÆUS SENECA—TUTOR TO

NERO—HIS ENORMOUS FORTUNE—HIS DEATH AND CHARACTER—INCONSISTENCIES IN HIS

PHILOSOPHY—A FAVOURITE WITH EARLY CHRISTIAN WRITERS—HIS EPISTLES—WORK ON

NATURAL PHENOMENA—APOCOLOCYNTOSIS—HIS STYLE.

M. ANNÆUS SENECA.

The family of the Senecas exercised a remarkable influence over

literature; they may, in fact, be said to have given the tone to the

taste of their age.

M. Annæus Seneca was born at Corduba (Cordova.) The precise date of his

birth is unknown; but Clinton places it about B. C. 61. This is not

improbable, for he asserts[1248] that he had heard all the eminent

orators except Cicero, and that he might have enjoyed that privilege

also if the civil wars had not compelled him to remain in his native

country. After this hinderance was removed by the accession of Augustus

he came to Rome, and, as a professional rhetorician, amassed a

considerable fortune. Subsequently he returned to Cordova, and married

Helvia, by whom he had three sons, of whom L. Annæus Seneca, the

philosopher, was the eldest.

He left behind him two works, the composition of which was the

employment of his old age. They are the results of his long and

successful experience as a teacher of rhetoric, the gleanings of his

commonplace book, the stores accumulated by his astonishing memory,

which enabled him to repeat two thousand unconnected words after once

hearing them, and to report literally any orations which he had heard

delivered. They are valuable as showing how a hollow and artificial

system, based upon the recollection of stock-passages and commonplaces,

had supplanted the natural promptings of true eloquence. They explain

the principles and practice of instruction in the popular schools of

rhetoric, the means by which the absence of natural endowments could be

compensated. They exhibit wit, learning, ingenuity, and taste to select

and admire the best literary specimens of earlier periods; but it is

plain that matter was now subordinate to form—that the orator was

content to borrow the phraseology of his predecessors in which to clothe

sentiments which he could neither feel nor understand. The ear still

yearned for the language of sincerity, although the heart no longer

throbbed with the ardour of patriotism. It is this want of conformity of

ideas to words which causes the coldness of a declamatory and florid

style. It is a mere representation of warmth: it disappoints like a mere

painted fire.

The first work of M. Seneca was entitled _Controversiæ_: it was divided

into ten books, of which, with the exception of fragments, only the

first, second, seventh, eighth, and tenth are extant. It contains a

series of exercises or declamations in judicial oratory on fictitious

cases. The imaginary causes were probably sketched out by the professor.

The students composed their speeches according to the rules of rhetoric:

they were then corrected, committed to memory, and recited, partly with

a view to practice, partly in order to amuse an admiring audience. The

cases are frequently as puerile as a schoolboy’s theme, sometimes

extravagant and absurd.

His other work, the _Suasoriæ_, contains exercises in deliberative

oratory. The subjects of them are taken from the historians and poets:

they are as harmless as tyranny could desire: there is no danger that

languid patriotism should revive, or the empire be menaced, by such

uninteresting discussions. Nor were they confined to mere students.

Public recitations had, since the days of Juvenal, been one of the

crying nuisances of the times. The poets began it, the rhetoricians

followed, and the most absurd trash was listened to with patience, being

ushered into popular notice by partial flatterers or hired claqueurs.

L. ANNÆUS SENECA.

L. Seneca was born at his father’s native town about the commencement of

the Christian era. He was brought to Rome when very young, and there

studied rhetoric and philosophy. He soon displayed great talents as a

pleader; and by his success is said to have provoked the jealousy of

Caligula. In the reign of Claudius he was accused by the infamous

Messalina of improper intimacy with Julia, the emperor’s niece, and was

accordingly banished to Corsica.[1249] He solaced his exile with the

study of the Stoic philosophy; and although its severe precepts

exercised no moral influence over his conduct, he not only professed

himself a Stoic, but sincerely imagined that he was one. Eight years

afterwards Agrippina caused his recall,[1250] in order to make him tutor

to her son Nero.

His pupil was naturally vicious; and Seneca, though wise and prudent,

was too unscrupulous a man of the world to attempt the correction of his

propensities, or to instil into him high principles. After the accession

of Nero,[1251] Seneca endeavoured to arrest his depraved career; but it

was too late: all he could do was to put into his mouth specious words

of clemency and mercy. He saw how dangerous was the unprincipled

ambition of Agrippina; and dreadful though it was to sanction parricide,

there was scarcely any other course to be pursued, except the consenting

to her death. When the deed was done, he had the pitiful meanness to

screen the murderer by a falsehood. He wrote a letter, which Nero sent

to the senate, accusing his mother of treason, and asserting that she

had committed suicide.[1252]

Seneca had by usury and legacy-hunting, amassed one of those enormous

fortunes, of which so many instances are met with in Roman history. This

had already exposed him to envy,[1253] and caused his temporary

banishment to the Balearic isles.[1254] But after that Burrus was dead,

who shared his influence over the Emperor, he felt the dangers of

wealth, and offered his property to Nero.[1255] The Emperor refused; but

Seneca retired from public life. Being now under the influence of new

favourites, Nero wished to rid himself of Seneca; and although there was

no evidence of his being privy to the conspiracy of Piso, it furnished a

pretext for his destruction.[1256] In adversity his character shone with

brighter lustre. Though he had lived ill, he could die well. His

firmness was the result, not of Stoical indifference, but of Roman

courage. He met the messengers of death without trembling. His noble

wife Paullina determined to die with him. The veins of both were opened

at the same time. The little blood which remained in his emaciated and

enfeebled frame refused to flow: he suffered excruciating agony: a warm

bath was applied, but in vain; and a draught of poison was equally

ineffectual. At last he was suffocated by the vapour of a stove, and

expired.[1257]

Seneca lived in a perilous atmosphere. The philosophy in which he

believed was hollow, and, being unsuited to his court life,[1258] he

thought it expedient to allow himself some relaxation from its severity.

His rhetorical taste led him to overstate even his own real convictions;

and hence the incongruity of his life appeared more glaring. He was not

insincere; but he had not firmness to act up to the high moral standard

which he proposed to himself. In his letters, and his treatise “_De

Consolatione_,” addressed to Polybius, he even convicts himself of this

defect. He had difficult questions to decide, and had not sufficient

moral principle to lead him in the right course. He was avaricious; but

it was the great sin of his times. Tacitus is not blind to his

weaknesses;[1259] but he estimates his character with more candour and

fairness than Dio.[1260] He is neither a panegyrist nor an accuser. The

education of one who was a brute rather than a man was a task to the

discharge of which no one would have been equal. He, therefore, retained

the influence which he had not uprightness to command by miserable and

sinful expedients. He had great abilities, and some of the noble

qualities of the old Romans. Had he lived in the days of the Republic he

would have been a great man.

Seneca was the author of twelve ethical treatises, the best of which are

entitled “_De Providentiâ_,” “_De Constantiâ Sapientis_,” and “_De

Consolatione_.” The latter was addressed to his mother Helvia, and

written during his exile in Corsica. In the treatise on Providence he

discusses the question why, since there is a Divine Providence, good men

are liable to misfortunes. Although the difficulty is explained by the

doctrine that the remedy, “_suicide_,” is always in man’s power, it

asserts the omnipresence of the Deity, and the existence of a moral

Governor of the universe.

Great as are the inconsistencies in his ethical philosophy (nor could it

be otherwise, as his life was always doing despite to his moral sense of

right and wrong,) his views are generally clear and practical. In this

he was a true Roman; he cared little for abstract speculation; he did

not value, except as subordinate aids, either mental or natural

philosophy. He delighted to inculcate precepts rather than investigate

principles. It is for this reason that his works are not satisfactory as

a whole, whilst they furnish a rich mine for quotations. The fault which

pervades all Roman philosophy exists in an exaggerated form in his

works: they are ethical digests of didactic precepts; but there is no

system, no developement of new truths. His studies taught him that

general principles are the foundations of morals, and that casuistry is

the application of those principles;[1261] but the Romans were naturally

inclined to be casuists rather than moralists; and in this preference

Seneca went beyond all his countrymen. He writes like a teacher of youth

rather than as a philosopher; he inculcates, without proof, maxims and

instructions, and impresses them by repetition, as though they

recommended themselves by their intrinsic truthfulness to the

consciences of his hearers.