This was probably delivered in his native Syria on his return after his
European lecture-tour which made him famous as a Sophist. In a whimsical
mixture of fact and fancy he describes his choice of a career. As a
young lad when he had just finished school, Lucian was apprenticed to
his mother’s brother, a sculptor, to learn to be “a good stone-cutter,
mason and sculptor.” On his first day he struck a slab of marble so hard
that he shattered it. Whereat his uncle gave him such a violent beating
that he ran home to his mother for comfort. That night he had a vision.
Two women were struggling to get possession of him. They were vastly
different in appearance and in the appeals they made to him, for they
were Sculpture and Education. Sculpture, unkempt, speaking haltingly and
like a barbarian, told Lucian that if he came to her, he would live
well, have strong shoulders, would never go abroad, but would gain such
fame as surrounded Phidias, Polyclitus, Myron, Praxiteles. Education in
her turn assured him that even if he became a famous sculptor, he would
be only a mechanic, living by his hands; she herself has much more to
offer him.
“If you follow my advice, first of all I shall show you many works of
men of old, tell you their wondrous deeds and words, and make you
conversant with almost all knowledge, and I shall ornament your soul,
which concerns you most, with many noble adornments—temperance,
justice, piety, kindliness, reasonableness, understanding,
steadfastness, love of all that is beautiful, ardour towards all that
is sublime; for these are the truly flawless jewels of the soul.
Nothing that came to pass of old will escape you, and nothing that
must now come to pass; nay, you will even foresee the future with me.
In a word, I shall speedily teach you everything that there is,
whether it pertains to the gods or to man.”[295]
Moreover, he will dress with distinction, will speak with eloquence.
Finally he may became as famous as Demosthenes or Aeschines. He must
recall that Socrates left sculpture for philosophy.
Lucian on hearing these two appeals gave himself to Education, who then
took him in a car with winged horses and from the air showed him the
cities and peoples of the world. After this vision she clothed him
suitably and returned him to his home. Lucian says he has told this
dream “in order that those who are young may take the better direction
and cleave to education, above all if poverty is making any one of them
faint-hearted.”[296]
Now although this choice of Lucian is based on the choice of
Hercules[297] and although facts are clothed in fantasy, the picture of
Lucian’s early apprenticeship may well be true, for the boy’s delight in
modelling little figures of wax seems to forecast Lucian’s life-long
interest in sculpture and other art forms.
The next crisis in Lucian’s literary life is depicted in _The Double
Indictment_, a dialogue composed when the author was forty. In it Lucian
appears in court to answer two charges: one of the rhetoricians, for
giving up speech-making and essay-writing; the other of the
philosophers, for using their sacred Platonic dialogue for satire.
Lucian’s trial takes place on the Areopagus with Justice presiding, but
the dialogue opens in heaven with a long complaint by Zeus about the
hard life of the gods especially his own, no time for anything. Hermes
who is listening tells him frankly that there are many complaints among
mortals on earth because of the slowness of the law courts. Zeus then
sends Hermes down to proclaim a session and orders Justice to preside at
it.
At this court, after various cases have been wittily disposed of, the
Syrian is called to face two indictments: Oratory versus the Syrian for
neglect, Dialogue versus the Syrian for maltreatment. Oratory first
relates how she found the plaintiff as a lad wandering in Ionia,
speaking with a foreign accent, dressed as a Syrian. She educated him
and at his eager request married him although all his dowry was
wonderful speeches. Next she had him made a citizen and then went
travelling with him to Greece, Ionia, Italy and Gaul. As he became
famous, he grew indifferent to her, for he was enamored of a bearded
man, Dialogue, said to be the son of Philosophy. Now he no longer makes
speeches, but has a strange way of using short questions. She sues him
for desertion. The Syrian replies that all her facts are true, but there
are others; she lost her modesty, made up like a courtesan, flirted
indiscriminately with many lovers. So he separated from her and went to
live with a respectable gentleman, Dialogue. The Syrian won the case.
Next Dialogue pleaded. His dignity, his cosmic thoughts, his tragic mask
have all been stolen from him. He has been forced to associate with
Jest, Satire, Cynicism, Eupolis and Aristophanes, “terrible men for
mocking at all that is holy and scoffing at all that is right,” finally
too even with Menippus. He has been transformed into a monster not
homogeneous but Centaur-like. The Syrian in reply showed the benefits
which he had bestowed on Dialogue: he taught him to walk like a man, to
clean up, to smile, to be yoked with Comedy. Dialogue resents that the
Syrian will not indulge in endless arguments on subtle themes. The
Syrian declares that he has not taken off Dialogue’s Greek cloak and put
him into barbarian garb: Dialogue is still dressed in his native Greek
costume. The Syrian was unanimously acquitted much to the delight of the
audience. This mock-trial picturesquely portrays Lucian’s change from
writing the philosophical dialogues in the style of Plato to the satiric
dialogue, influenced successively by New Attic Comedy, Menippus and Old
Attic Comedy.[298] Lucian here is writing an Apology for the new style
of satire-dialogue which he created.
With similar wit but in various modes Lucian in other pieces satirizes
now Rhetoric, now Philosophy. An illuminating series of such dialogues
is _The Professor of Oratory_, _Nigrinus_, _Philosophies for Sale_, _The
Fisherman_.
In _The Professor of Oratory_ ironic advice is given to a young man on
how to become an orator and a sophist. The quest is noble and the way to
success is not difficult. The Lady Rhetoric sits fair and desirable on
the top of a high mountain attended by Wealth, Fame and Power. Thither
two roads lead. One is a narrow, steep and thorny path, the other an
easy slope amid flowers and fountains. Two guides will present
themselves to you. One, vigorous and manly, will point out to you the
hard way in the footprints of Demosthenes and Plato and will tell how
severe the training must be for their followers. He will wish, the
simpleton, to make you model yourself on the past.
The other guide is a pretty gentleman, daintily groomed and perfumed,
with an alluring smile and a honey voice. He will tell you that you can
become such an orator as he is if you carry as equipment ignorance,
boldness, shamelessness; if you dress in bright, diaphanous robes and
always carry a book! Your course of study will be the memorizing of a
few stock words, a few learned references for ornaments of your
discourse. He will teach you a high singsong chant and the art of always
beginning with stories from the Iliad.
Your fame will be secured by a well-trained chorus of applauders in your
audiences and by slanders of all your rivals. In private life you must
live fast with dice, wine and women, so you come to be talked of as a
deuce of a fellow, and amours will increase your income. Thus you will
be fitted to be the bridegroom of Rhetoric by driving furiously the
winged chariot of which Plato wrote. Your adviser is already getting out
of your way, for he was defeated when once you chose the primrose path.
This picture of _The Perfect Rhetorician_ has been thought by some
critics to be a personal satire of the contemporary lexicographer
Pollux. However that may be, it is certainly a satire of any
pseudo-professor of rhetoric who bases oratory on cheap externalities
and superficial training.
At another time Lucian was to satirize pseudo-philosophers as he had
rhetoricians, but once, perhaps in the beginning of revolt against
rhetoric, he chose to picture a noble type in the dialogue on Nigrinus,
a philosopher unknown except through Lucian. His great tribute to
Nigrinus may be set as a companion piece to the mocking praise of _The
Perfect Rhetorician_. The dialogue is prefaced by an introductory letter
in which Lucian tells Nigrinus that he is not carrying owls to Athens in
offering him this book as if to display his use of words, but he is
sending it in thanks for Nigrinus’ words. In the dialogue itself one man
relates to another how by talking with Nigrinus he was made free instead
of a slave, poor instead of rich. For Nigrinus praised philosophy and
the freedom it gives and ridiculed what men in general exalt: wealth,
fame, power, honor. Nigrinus praised Athens because there Poverty and
Philosophy are foster-brothers; there life is free, noble, harmonious.
Rome is the city for those who love wealth and luxury, wine and women.
The Romans have given themselves over to the pleasures of the senses and
have every means of gratifying them. So Nigrinus in Rome leads a life of
retirement, conversing with Philosophy and with Plato, reflecting on the
ridiculous rich, the parasites, the pseudo-philosophers, the
will-hunters, the gourmands, the frequenters of the circus and the
baths. No wonder men come to him for healing.
The tribute to Platonism here, the tribute to Epicurus in _Alexander the
False Prophet_,[299] might tempt readers to affiliate Lucian with one or
the other of these philosophical schools. But as if to forestall being
labelled, in the spirit of Horace’s famous line
nullius addictus iurare in verba magistri,[300]
Lucian turns his satire on all the leading creeds of the time in his
_Philosophies for Sale_.
Zeus orders an auction of philosophies. Hermes acts as crier and
auctioneer. The buyer questions each person who is put up for sale on
his knowledge, on his creed, on his use. A Pythagorean is put up first
by Hermes who asks: “Who wishes to know about the harmony of the world
and re-birth?” The Pythagorean attempts to expound to the buyer the
catharsis of the spirit, the need of music and of geometry, the flux of
the cosmos, the divinity in numbers, the transmigration of souls. An
Italian bought him for a brotherhood in Magna Graecia for ten minas.
A Cynic is next displayed, dirty, morose, ready to bark at everyone. He
declares that Hercules is his model and that like Hercules he is a
militant reformer, working to clear the world of filth. He declares that
he will teach his purchaser to discard luxury, to endure hardship, to
drink only water, to throw his money into the sea, to reject all family
ties, to live in a tomb or a jar. So he will feel no pain even when
flogged and will be happier than the Great King. He will be bold,
abusive, savage, shameless. For such a life no education is necessary.
The Cynic is sold for two obols.
The third called is the Cyrenaic, who appears clad in purple and crowned
with a wreath. Hermes announces that his philosophy is the sweetest,
indeed thrice blessed. As the Cyrenaic is too drunk to answer questions,
Hermes describes his virtues: he is pleasant to live with, congenial to
drink with, a companion for amours, and an excellent chef! There was no
bid for him!
Next two are put up together, the one who laughs and the one who cries.
The first explains his laughter on the ground that all men and all their
affairs are ridiculous; all things are folly, a mere drift of atoms. The
weeper pities men because their lives are foreordained and in them
nothing is stable; men themselves are mere pawns in the game of eternity
and the gods are only immortal men. No one bids for the pair.
An Academic next advertises his wares as a teacher of the art of love,
but claims that this love is of the soul, not of the body. He affirms
that he lives in a city fashioned by himself, where wives are held in
common, fair boys are prizes for valor, and realities are ideas, visible
only to the wise. He was bought for two talents.
A pupil of the laugher and the drunkard is now offered for sale, namely
Epicurus. The mere description of him as more irreverent than his
teachers, charming, fond of good eating, sells him for two minas.
The sad philosopher of the Porch is now announced by Hermes who
proclaims that he is selling virtue itself and that the Stoic is “the
only wise man, the only handsome man, the only just man, brave man,
king, orator, rich man, lawgiver, and everything else that there
is.”[301] His talk about himself is full of hair-splitting dialectics
and subtle explanations of why man must devote himself “to the chief
natural goods ... wealth, health, and the like”[301] and go through much
toil for much learning. In spite of all this he is bought for twenty
minas.
The Peripatetic is also sold for twenty minas because he knows
everything but the Sceptic brings in only one mina because he knows
nothing! The auction ends with the announcement by Hermes of another
sale the next day of plain men, workmen, tradesmen.
Inevitably this ironic treatment of the great philosophies of Greece
produced a storm of criticism. This was answered by Lucian in an apology
of sorts under the title _The Resurrected or The Fisherman_. In it the
satirist under the pseudonym of Frankness faces his accusers. For up
from the dead, led by a militant Socrates, come to Athens Empedocles,
Plato, Aristotle and other phantoms to execute worthy dooms on the worst
of maligners. Frankness by rhetoric and argument averts stoning or
crucifixion and secures a fair trial, presided over by Philosophy, who
is attended by Truth, Investigation and Virtue. After Diogenes makes the
speech for the prosecution, Frankness replies in defense of himself—and
Lucian! He wins a unanimous verdict for acquittal by his claim that he
auctioned off, not the great philosophers who now prosecute him, but
base impostors who imitate them. Syllogism now acts as herald and calls
from Athens to court all the philosophers to defend themselves.
Frankness by promising largess secures a crowd of them, Platonists,
Stoics, Peripatetics, Epicureans, Academics. When Philosophy announces
that they are to be tried as impostors by herself, Virtue and Truth,
they all disappear in wild rout. To get them back, Frankness now becomes
a fisherman and, with bait of gold, hooks and hauls back the craven
cheats. The head of each school disowns his imitators and the discarded
are thrown down over the cliffs. Finally Philosophy dismisses the court
with an injunction to Frankness to keep investigating philosophers in
order to crown the true and brand the false.
The genial tone of _Philosophies for Sale_ has entirely vanished in the
essay on _The End of Peregrinus_. The influence of New Comedy and of
Menippus with their ironic raillery is superseded by Aristophanic
denunciation. Bitter mockery, cruel derision are loosed upon one creed,
the Cynic. Lucian directs his vituperation against the Cynic philosopher
Peregrinus, whose career had been meteoric. In his early life he was
converted to Christianity, and even went to prison for his faith. Later,
beliefs of India so possessed him that he immolated himself at Olympia
just after the Olympic games of A.D. 165. Such self-sacrifice by
cremation had been consummated at Susa by Calanus before Alexander the
Great and by Zarmarus after initiation into the mysteries at Athens in
the presence of Augustus.
Lucian saw only one possible interpretation of Peregrinus’
self-sacrifice, desire for notoriety, but there have been many critics
of this motivation as Harmon points out:[302]
“Lucian believes himself to be exposing a sham, whose zeal was not at
all for truth but only for applause and renown. Many notable modern
critics, including Zeller, Bernays, Croiset, and Wilamowitz, dissent
from his interpretation, discerning in the man an earnest seeker after
truth; for to them thirst for glory is not an adequate explanation of
his final act.”
The piece is written as a letter to Cronius who is marked as a Platonist
by the formula of greeting εὖ πράττειν. Lucian begins with the fact of
Peregrinus’ self-imposed death and at once ascribes to him the motive of
love of notoriety. This, he says, is proved by the fact that Peregrinus
selected for the time of his suicide the Olympic festival, which draws
great crowds. Lucian knows that Cronius will have a good laugh at the
foolishness of the old man so he will write his friend just what he
himself saw as he stood near the pyre.
His method is clever. First Theagenes a Cynic proclaimed in the streets
of Elis the glory of virtue and the glory of her follower Proteus
(Peregrinus) and announced that Proteus was about to leave this life by
fire in the manner of Hercules, Aesculapius, Dionysus and Empedocles.
Theagenes’ justification of the deed went unheard because of the noise
of the crowd, but another orator (clearly Lucian) stepped forth and made
a speech reviewing Peregrinus’ career. Beginning with Democritean
laughter he narrated the life of Proteus accusing him of adultery as a
youth in Armenia, of corrupting a boy in Asia, of strangling his own
father, of becoming a Christian in Palestine, of resigning all his
property in Parium on the Hellespont, of practicing the ascetic life in
Egypt, of seeking notoriety in Greece by denouncing Herodes Atticus for
his aqueduct at Olympia and later recanting. Finally, says Lucian, this
Proteus has announced his intention of cremating himself. The motive is
love of fame though he claims that he wishes thus to teach men to
despise death and endure torture. He plainly hopes that myths and a cult
will arise around his memory. Indeed Theagenes has quoted a prophecy to
that effect, but Lucian can match that oracle with another which orders
all the Cynic’s disciples to imitate him even to the last leap into the
flames.
After these speeches, Lucian was on hand when the pyre was kindled at
Harpina near Olympia shortly after midnight. As an eye-witness he saw
the pyre in a pit six feet deep, Peregrinus in the dress of a Cynic
bearing a torch, men lighting the fire, how then Peregrinus stripped to
his old shirt and after crying: “Spirits of my mother and my father,
receive me with goodwill,” leaped into the flames to be seen no more.
Even when the other Cynics stood about the pyre in silent grief, Lucian
felt no sympathy, but taunted them brutally, and actually got into a
broil with them before he departed to meditate on how strange the love
of fame is. Lucian had to tell the story of Peregrinus’ death over and
over until to amuse himself, he invented a vulture that he saw flying
from the flames to heaven, crying: “I have left the earth, I am going to
Olympus.” And this invention of his became part of the growing myth
about the hero.
“So ended (wrote Lucian) that poor wretch Proteus, a man who (to put
it briefly) never fixed his gaze on the verities, but always did and
said everything with a view to glory and the praise of the multitude,
even to the extent of leaping into fire, when he was sure not to enjoy
the praise because he could not hear it.”[303]
Lucian concludes with anecdotes about Peregrinus sea-sick, in a fever,
having eye-trouble and trying to cure fever and correct vision as though
Aeacus in the lower world would care about either ailment. He was simply
furnishing Democritus with more cause for laughter. This heartless
ridicule of the Cynic’s action takes no account of the psychology of
fanaticism or the hysteria of martyrdom. Croiset points out that
Lucian’s insensitivity to all mysticism must be viewed with the
knowledge that the satirist believed Peregrinus was a sham and that he
was unveiling an impostor. Lucian’s consistent worship of veracity and
frankness then explain his derisive attitude towards the apotheosis of a
pretender.[304]
The savagery used in exposing a false philosopher was turned by Lucian
upon a religious fraud, Alexander of Abonoteichus. The piece is a letter
to a friend, Celsus, written after A.D. 180, ten years after Alexander’s
death. Lucian’s account gives almost all we know of this Alexander
although his existence and influence are attested by gems, coins and
inscriptions. The letter, however, as Croiset points out, contains more
satire than history, for it does not attempt to distinguish scrupulously
between the false and the true; rather it presents in lively anecdotes
and personal reminiscences a satiric portrait of an historical
prophet.[305] Cumont has commented on the unique features of
Abonoteichus’ version of the worship of Aesculapius: the giving a
serpent a human head and calling it the god incarnate; the issuing of
oracles and advice instead of using incubation or dealing particularly
with healing.[306]
Lucian exposes all Alexander’s shams and corruptions. He describes his
handsome appearance and education, his cleverness in purchasing a tame
serpent and in selecting the site of Abonoteichus for his oracle. He
describes the installation of the serpent, the invention of the human
head for it, the exhibition of it, the methods of giving oracles, the
prices, the publicity, the “autophones,” cunningly contrived to issue
from the serpent’s mouth, the spread of his fame even to Italy. Lucian
pictures too the perils that menaced any critics of the oracle, the
burning of the sayings of Epicurus, the personal danger to himself.
Lucian was advised by the governor of Bithynia and Pontus not to
prosecute Alexander for his attempted murder so after the prophet’s
death he wrote this account to honor Epicurus and to present the truth
to thinking minds. Personal revenge then as well as horror at religious
fraud motivated this biography. Lucian, who derided Epicureans in
_Philosophies for Sale_, chooses now to revere their founder!
One of Lucian’s greatest works bears the title _Parasites for Pay_. It
was written and undoubtedly read to the public in the last part of his
life before he went to Egypt. It is not only very distinguished as a
satire,[307] but in it as Gildersleeve points out[308] “his
sensitiveness for Greek honor, for the honor of the people as well as
for the honor of the literary class, manifests itself in a way to do
infinite credit to Lucian’s heart.” Harmon calls it “a Hogarthian sketch
of the life led by educated Greeks who attached themselves to the
households of great Roman lords—and ladies.”[309]
The satire is in the form of a letter addressed to a friend Timocles who
is thinking of taking such a post. The case, says Lucian, is the same
for philosophers, grammarians, rhetoricians, and musicians. The motives
which apparently led men to accept such positions are poverty and
pleasure, but their recompense is small and they have no share in the
luxury that dazzled them. They overwork; their expenses in clothing and
tips eat up their stipends. Moreover their humiliations are incessant.
The first dinner given in their honor brings the strain of observing
proper etiquette. Next morning the conference about salary disappoints
all hopes by the pittance offered. But a man sells himself and never
afterwards can feel free or noble: he is a monkey with a chain around
his neck. For he was not engaged to discourse on Homer, Demosthenes,
Plato, but because it looks well to have a distinguished Greek
philosopher with a long beard and a flowing robe in his master’s suite.
The day’s routine of service is exhausting and humiliating, and the
philosopher’s rivals for his lord’s favor are a gigolo, a dancing
master, an Alexandrian dwarf who recites erotic verses. The night’s
sleep is shattered by meditations on lost freedom and present servitude.
Such is life in the city, but a trip to the country is worse.
Thermopolis had to hold his lady’s puppy for her in the jolting carriage
and the miserable little dog kept licking his beard for relics of
yesterday’s dinner and finally laid a litter of puppies in the
philosopher’s cloak. Other services of the parasite include listening to
the rich man’s literary compositions and delivering a lecture on
philosophy to the lady while her hair is being dressed or at the
dinner-table. And in the midst of a discourse on virtue a maid brings
her a letter from a paramour which she answers at once with a yes.
In time, envy and slander or the disabilities of old age cause the
parasite’s downfall and he is discarded on the rubbish heap. Such a
career can best be depicted in a symbolic painting of a hill on whose
summit golden Wealth resides. Hope, Deceit, Slavery help the traveller
start on the ascent. But Toil then escorts him on. And finally Old Age,
Insolence and Despair lead him until he is ejected by a hidden back
door, naked, deformed, ruined. Repentance meeting him cannot save him.
Timocles is urged before making his decision about the post offered him
to meditate on this picture and on Plato’s famous words: “God is not at
fault; the fault is his who maketh the choice.”[310] This essay alone
would justify Croiset’s great tribute to Lucian’s independence of
thought: “among his contemporaries Lucian stands alone as an
intelligence of a remarkable force and independence which nothing could
tame.”[311]
It was natural that, when later Lucian accepted a post in civil service
in Egypt, he should anticipate reminders of his essay on _Parasites for
Pay_ on the part of his friends and foes. His _Apology_[312] answers
their imaginary criticisms of his inconsistencies. It is written in the
form of a letter to a friend. Lucian assures this Sabinus that he knows
Sabinus enjoyed his recent essay on Parasites, but now must be full of
amazement at his friend’s accepting a salaried post in Egypt. He
imagines receiving an epistle from Sabinus to this effect:[313]
“The difference between your precept and practice is infinitely more
ridiculous; you draw a realistic word-picture of that servile life;
you pour contempt on the man who runs into the trap of a rich man’s
house, where a thousand degradations, half of them self-inflicted,
await him; and then in extreme old age, when you are on the border
between life and death, you take this miserable servitude upon you and
make a sort of circus exhibition of your chains. The conspicuousness
of your position will only make the more ridiculous that contrast
between your book and your life.”
Lucian in reply suggests various lines of self-defense: the compulsion
of Chance, Fate or Necessity; admiration of his patron’s character; the
drive of poverty, brought on by old age and ill health. But he rejects
all these pleas. His real defense is the difference between being a
parasite and slave in the house of a rich master and entering civil
service to work for the state. Lucian explains the dignity and the
responsibility of the post he has accepted in the service of the
Emperor.
“What better use can you make of yourself than if you join forces with
your friends in the cause of progress, come out into the open, and let
men see that you are loyal and zealous and careful of your trust, not
what Homer calls a vain cumberer of the earth?”[314]
Even this brief review of the writings which make up Lucian’s literary
autobiography shows the conflicting forces which strove for dominance
over his life. Sculpture and the Education of a Sophist first contended
for his favor and his choice of the orator’s training never destroyed
his life-long interest in art. Oratory which secured his service soon
disillusionized him because of her cheap followers. Plato and his
philosophical dialogues for a while controlled his mind and style, but,
satire proving stronger in him than reflective thinking, he created a
new form of dialogue allied to Comedy and Menippus for his medium of
comment on the world. This form and the epistle he used for satirizing
sophistry and oratory, philosophy and religion, always pointing out the
counterfeit and the sham and distinguishing them from the tested gold of
verities. This same sort of touch-stone he applied in his _Apology_ to
his own life to vindicate his maintenance of personal freedom. The
traveller, the sophist, the satirist, now become civil servant of the
Emperor, admits no chain about his neck.
As regards his literary art he has revealed that his main ideals are
frankness, truth and freedom. In his works he establishes warm human
contacts with his hearer or reader. His Greek style achieves a pure
Attic simplicity of expression and by it, as Croiset says,[315] he
clothes abstract ideas in words which give them body and form. The main
qualities of his style, spirit and imagination, unite in the effective
descriptions and narrations which fill his works. His wealth of ideas
found expression in realistic details noted with keen observation and
assembled in realistic series to give vitality to his prose.
One work by Lucian is a specific treatise on writing and peculiarly
significant for his literary autobiography. That is the essay on _How
History Should Be Written_. It was composed as a letter to a friend
Philo in the time of Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus. The occasion was
the sudden spawning of a whole shoal of would-be historians after the
Roman victories in the war with the Parthians (A.D. 165). Outraged by
these scribblers, Lucian sets forth his thoughts on the True Historian.
Since the barbarian war began, says Lucian, everyone is writing history.
It is just as when an epidemic of madness at Abdera made all the people
chant tragedies. It recalls too Diogenes, who, when Corinth was in
danger of a siege from Philip and the citizens were hurrying defense
measures, kept rolling his jar up and down hill that he might seem as
busy as the rest of the world. Lucian’s advice will include the faults
of historians which are to be avoided, the virtues to be cultivated.
History must not be written as panegyric. History must not be written as
poetry. Among the faults of contemporary historians are lack of taste,
over-abundance of details, purple patches, inaccuracies about facts.
“There are some ... who leave alone, or deal very cursorily with, all
that is great and memorable; amateurs and not artists, they have no
selective faculty, and loiter over copious laboured descriptions of
the various trifles; it is as if a visitor to Olympia, instead of
examining, commending or describing to his stay-at-home friends the
general greatness and beauty of the Zeus, were to be struck with the
exact symmetry and polish of its footstool, or the proportions of its
shoe, and give all his attention to these minor points.”[316]
Indispensable qualities of the ideal historian are political insight and
ability in writing. His “one task is to tell the thing as it
happened.”[317] He will be “fearless, incorruptible, independent, a
believer in frankness and veracity; one that will call a spade a spade,
make no concession to likes and dislikes, nor spare any men for pity or
respect or propriety; an impartial judge, kind to all, but too kind to
none; a literary cosmopolite with neither suzerain nor king, never
heeding what this or that man may think, but setting down the thing that
befell.”[317] Thucydides fulfills this ideal.
In diction and style, the marks of the true historian are frankness and
truth, lucidity and simplicity. The preface should be in proportion to
the subject. “The body of the history ... is nothing from beginning to
end but a long narrative; it must therefore be graced with the narrative
virtues—smooth, level, and consistent progress, neither soaring nor
crawling, and the charm of lucidity.” “Brevity is always desirable.”
“Restraint in descriptions of mountains, walls, rivers, and the like, is
very important.” If a speech is introduced, “the first requirement is
that it should suit the character both of the speaker and of the
occasion.” “It may occasionally happen that some extraordinary story has
to be introduced; it should be simply narrated, without guarantee of its
truth, thrown down for any-one to make what he can of it.” The historian
should write not for the present, but for eternity. He should hope to
have said of himself: “This was a man indeed, free and free-spoken;
flattery and servility were not in him; he was truth all through.”[318]
Gildersleeve was probably right in calling the _True History_ “a comic
sequel to a brilliant essay entitled ‘How to write History.’”[319] The
traditional manuscript order which places the _True History_ after _How
History Should Be Written_ seems so aptly prompted by Lucianic irony.
For this romance in two books is not history at all and has nothing of
Lucian’s primary requirement for history, that it should be true! It is
a work of pure imagination, one of the earliest accounts of fictitious
voyages and as such is part of the great tradition from the Odyssey to
_Gulliver’s Travels_.[320] Lucian’s preface explains both the nature of
the piece and his reasons for writing it.[321]
The _True History_ like many good stories is told in the first person by
Lucian himself. The author, moreover, preludes and interrupts the
narrative to get in direct touch with his reader. In his introduction,
he states that his purpose in writing is to furnish to students some
reading that will give relaxation, but at the same time “a little food
for thought.” The story is bound to charm, Lucian thinks, because of the
novelty of the subject, the humor of the plan, the plausible lying
involved and the comical parodies of such authors as Ctesias, Iambulus,
and Homer in his Odyssey. Lucian confesses to being a liar with the best
of them, but affirms that his lying is unique in being honest because he
admits it.
“Be it understood, then, that I am writing about things which I have
neither seen nor had to do with nor learned from others—which, in
fact, do not exist at all and, in the nature of things, cannot exist.
Therefore my readers should on no account believe in them.”[322]
In spite of this confession, Lucian here and there in his story tries to
create an atmosphere of veracity by protestations of it. As he never saw
the Corn Sparrow forces or the Crane Knights, he does not venture to
relate the marvellous and incredible stories told about them.[323] When
he describes the magic mirror over a well in the Moon which furnished
him television of his family and country he says that disbelievers by
going there will find he tells the truth.[324] In the Island of the
Wicked, Lucian finds all liars, both those who had told lies on earth or
written them, among the latter Ctesias and Herodotus. “On seeing them,”
he says, “I had good hopes for the future, for I have never told a lie
that I know of.”[325] The last sentence of the romance is: “What
happened in the other world I shall tell you in the succeeding
books.”[326] This, a Greek scholiast comments, is the greatest lie of
all!
Now after having seen what a wag Lucian is from his own words, we must
decide how we are going to take him. Are we to seek in him relaxation
and entertainment (the gift of all true romance) or are we going to
marshal our “little learning” to meet his and study all his sources, his
parodies of historians and philosophers, or search for allegories in his
fantastic worlds? The happy way will be along the path of the golden
mean. Gildersleeve put up a sign-board to it and inscribed directions
for future travellers.
“To enjoy the show properly, it is far better for the reader to give
himself up to this play of Lucian’s fancy than to endeavor to unriddle
whatever satire of contemporary literature may lie concealed in its
allegory.... There may be profound meaning in the war which breaks out
between the Sunburghers under Phaêthon, and the Moonburghers under
Endymion, which begins with the attempt of the Moonburghers to found a
colony on the desert planet of Lucifer, and which ends with the
victory of the Sunburghers, Lucifer being declared common property and
the vanquished compelled to pay an annual tribute of ten thousand
_amphoreis_ of dew. But so elastic are all such allegories that they
can be stretched to fit anything, and the war of these Heliotes and
Selenites would answer to describe the conflict between orthodoxy and
rationalism, and Lucifer would stand for the coming man. But how much
better to look with childish interest on the marshalling of
Horsevultures and Chickpeashooters and Garlickfighters and
Flea-archers and Wind-runners, and to watch the huge spiders spin
their web from the moon to Lucifer.”[327]
So after realizing that we too may visit the Isles of the Blessed and
the Wicked, may soar up to Aristophanes’ Cloudcuckooland or dive under
the sea in the brother of Jonah’s whale, or see Sinbad’s roc, let us
begin at the beginning. Let the lights go out and the curtain go up. Let
us watch breathlessly an ancient Walt Disney fantasy rush across the
screen. The very names of countries and peoples add to the excitement as
the panorama unrolls. And so vivid are Lucian’s descriptions that as in
all good movies soon we find ourselves participating in his adventures.
Having set out from the Pillars of Hercules with fifty men on a good
ship, on the eightieth day we come to a wooded island. Here huge
footprints and an inscription reveal that Hercules and Dionysus were
here before us. And no wonder, for this is the Isle of Wines:
grape-vines produce springs of wine, springs feed rivers, rivers produce
fish that eaten make people drunk. And there is a species of vine that
is half grape and half lady like Daphne turning into a laurel and the
kiss of the Vine-woman brings intoxication and her embrace is a prison.
We lost two of our men to that captivity.
As we set sail, a whirlwind lifted the ship and she became a hydroplane,
sailing through the air for seven days and seven nights. The island
where then we landed proved to be the Moon. Endymion is the King so of
course he spoke Greek and we at once joined his forces for he had a war
on with the Men of the Sun, whose King is Phaethon. It was all about
which should colonize the Morning Star. Our fellow Moonites were as
strange as their names: Vulture Knights, Grass Plumes, Pea Shooters,
Garlic Warriors, Flea Bowmen, Wind Aviators, Corn Sparrows and Crane
Knights. And Phaethon’s Heliotes were as fantastic: Ant Knights,
Mosquito Aviators, Dance Aviators, Stalk Mushrooms, Dog-faced Knights,
Cloud Centaurs. A fierce battle we had and the Men of the Sun won
because they cut off light from the Moon so Endymion surrendered. We saw
strange marvels in our stay on the Moon: how men are the child-bearers;
how their clothing is made of glass or bronze; their eyes are removable;
they have a mirror over a well in which they can see what happens in far
distant lands.
As we voyaged onward, we came to many other countries: to the Morning
Star which was just being colonized, to Lamp Town where among the
inhabitants Lucian found his own Lamp which gave him news of home, to
Cloudcuckooland which Aristophanes described so truthfully. But after
such interesting scenes, disaster fell upon us. A monstrous whale bore
down upon us and in a trice swallowed us, ship and all.
When we recovered from our terror, we found that life inside a whale is
confined but not impossible. We discovered an island where we beached
our boat. The whale opened his mouth once an hour so we could mark time
and get the points of the compass. And we soon met other men there, a
Cypriote called Scintharus and his son. Scintharus told us about the
other inhabitants of the whale, who were savage barbarians, and always
ready to attack them. We thought best to join Scintharus in subduing
these enemies, but the fight was fierce for there were scores of these
Lobsters, Crabhands, Tunnyheads, Seagoats, Crawfish Coots and Solefish.
After our victory, we lived fairly well in the whale for a year and
eight months. In the ninth month, we saw through the teeth of our
monster the most terrifying battle, a sea-fight between men riding on
huge islands each of which carried about one hundred and twenty.
In spite of seeing such dangers outside, we decided finally that we must
escape from our prison. We used fire as a weapon, set the forest at the
tail-end aflame and after twelve days found that the whale was going to
die. Just in time we propped open his mouth with huge beams and the next
day when he expired, out we went on our good ship and felt once more the
wind in our sails. Fair weather did not last long. A terrible northern
gale descended and froze all the sea to a depth of six fathoms.
Scintharus, who was now our ship-master, saved us by directing us to
excavate a cave-home in the ice. In it we lived for thirty days,
building a fire and cooking the fish we cut out of the ice. When food
gave out, we dug out the boat and sailed over the ice as though it were
the sea until on the fifth day we came to open water. Now we kept coming
to various islands. We got water at one and at the next one milk, for
this island had grapes whose juice was milk, and its earth was cheese.
It was easy to subsist there! Next we passed the Isle of Cork where the
city is built on a cork foundation and the men have feet of cork so that
they can run over the waters as they will, buoyed up by their own
life-preservers!
Happiest of all our stays was that on the Island of the Blessed. Here it
is always spring. Every month the vines yield grapes and the trees
fruit. It is a land flowing with milk and wine. Glass trees furnish
goblets which fill automatically at the banquet. Baked loaves of bread
are plucked from trees. Beside the table are two springs, one of
laughter, one of joy, and with draughts from these the banqueters start
their revels. Famous men dwell there. I saw Socrates surrounded by fair
young men arguing with Nestor and Palamedes. Plato preferred to live in
his own Republic. The followers of Aristippus and Epicurus were
considered the best of companions, but Diogenes the Cynic had reformed,
married Lais and taken to dancing. The Stoics had not yet arrived for
they were still toiling up the steep hill of virtue. Conversation with
Homer was one of the greatest pleasures, especially as he settled the
matter of his birthplace by declaring himself a Babylonian and solved
the Homeric question by affirming that he had written all the lines
attributed to him. Beside literary talks, there were games for the Dead.
Even the Island of the Blessed could not be free from wars, for the
Wicked invaded it and had to be expelled by force. Homer wrote a new
epic on the fight of the dead heroes. The Island had its scandals too
all due again to Helen. For she bewitched Scintharus’ son and tried to
elope with him, but was caught. That episode caused our expulsion from
the Island of the Blessed. Before we left, Homer wrote a couplet for
Lucian which he had carved on a stele of beryl and Odysseus secretly
gave him a letter for Calypso.
We touched at the Isle of the Wicked and at the Isle of Dreams, where we
slept thirty days and next we put in at Ogygia. Lucian read Odysseus’
letter before he delivered it to Calypso and found he had always
regretted leaving her! For Odysseus’ sake, Calypso entertained us
royally.
Next we fell into danger from the Pumpkin Pirates and the Hardshell
Pirates and the Dolphin-Riders, but we escaped them all. One night we
ran aground on the marvellous and mighty nest of a king-fisher. And a
little further on in the sea we came to a forest of rootless trees which
we could not penetrate. There was nothing to do but haul the ship up to
their tops and take “a forest cruise” across. More marvellous still we
had to cross a water-chasm on a water bridge, a river-way between two
water precipices. After that we came to the Isle of the Bellowing
Bullheads, men like Minotaurs, and had some skirmishes with them. And
then we came to an Island of Fair Ladies who wished to take us to bed
with them, but Lucian discovered that they all had ass-legs and that
they ate strangers when they had cozened them to sleep. So we departed
in haste. At dawn we saw the land which is on the other side of the
world from ours and there we were shipwrecked. What happened there will
be another story.
This review of the two books of Lucian’s _True History_ reveals at once
its startling differences from the other Greek romances of the early
Empire. Romantic love does not figure in it. Religion has little or no
place in it. Adventures are its bones and sinews. These adventures
though described realistically are all figments of the imagination,
explorations of the Wonderful Things beyond Thule as much as those of
Antonius Diogenes must have been. The coloring of the pictures is an
amazing mixture of realism and fantasy. The veracity of sense
impressions almost converts doubting Thomases. Lucian comes to seem no
mean rival of Herodotus, the Father of Lies. Only occasionally some
satiric laughter betrays him.
It is perhaps easier for twentieth century readers to accept his wonders
than it was for his contemporaries of the second century. Science has
developed so many of his imaginative forecasts. The monstrous footprints
of Hercules and Dionysus might be rock-prints of dinosaurs. The plunging
whale is a submarine. His ship lifting from the ocean to sail through
the air has become the hydroplane. His island galleys bearing one
hundred and twenty men each are our battleships. The Cloud Centaurs who
fight in the air are our aviators. Arctic explorers have lived in huts
made of ice-blocks. Ice-sailing is a recognized winter sport. Clothing
is made not of glass or bronze, but of cellulose and steel. Removable
eyes suggest spectacles, contact lenses and field-glasses. The
Cork-footed Men must have resembled surf riders. And the magic mirror
over the well anticipated the perforated sphere of television.
But his contemporaries had the advantage of us in recognizing Lucian’s
sources and parodies more readily than we can. For us, Antonius
Diogenes, Ctesias and Iambulus are lost. Yet Photius records that the
romance of Antonius Diogenes, _The Wonders beyond Thule_, was the chief
source of Lucian’s _True History_. So many, however, are the sources
which Lucian used to forward his avowed purpose of furnishing relaxation
accompanied by some learning, that scholars have busied themselves for
years tracing parallels with Greek and Latin authors.[328] Allinson
remarks wisely: “In general, it seems safe to conclude that Lucian
regarded the writings of predecessors and contemporaries as an open
quarry from which he first built up his own style and then picked out
material to imbed, with an artist’s skill, in the parti-coloured mosaic
of his satire.”[329]
Some idea of Lucian’s parody of his sources may be gained, even though
Antonius Diogenes is lost, from his incidental flings at great Greeks
and from his constant references to Homer which are a mixture of
admiration and irony. So when he saw Cloudcuckooland he remembered
Aristophanes the poet, “a wise and truthful man whose writings are
distrusted without reason.”[330] On the Island of the Blessed he did not
find Plato for he preferred to live in the city of his imagination under
his own constitution and laws. Yet he might well have been in Elysium
for the inhabitants are most Platonic in sharing their wives.[331] The
solemn treaty which ended the wars between the Men of the Sun and the
Men of the Moon has a comical resemblance to the treaty between Athens
and Sparta which Thucydides records though it is signed by Fireman,
Hotman, and Burner, by Nightman, Moonman and Allbright.[332]
Herodotus comes in for more imitation, for he furnishes stories of ants
bigger than foxes,[333] of dog-headed men,[334] of men who feed on
odors,[335] of a feast of lanterns in Egypt,[336] of a floating
island,[337] of the sea freezing,[338] of a breeze that bears the
perfume of Arabia.[339] But when Lucian solemnly imitates these
exaggerations, we feel he has his tongue in his cheek and our suspicion
is confirmed when he consigns Ctesias and Herodotus to the limbo of
Liars in the Island of the Wicked.[340]
Lucian’s treatment of Homer shows his most genial irony. In his preface
he makes Homer’s Odysseus the guide and teacher of all historians of
imaginary travels, Odysseus “who tells Alcinous and his court about
winds in bondage, one-eyed men, cannibals and savages; also about
animals with many heads, and transformations of his comrades wrought
with drugs,” and with such marvels “humbugged the illiterate
Phaeacians.”[341] But in the Island of the Blessed, Homer is the shade
in whose talk Lucian most delights. Homer indeed is most affable in
discussing all the literary problems of his epics, especially since he
had just won a lawsuit in which Thersites accused him of libel, through
the aid of his lawyer Odysseus.[342] Homer as a shade is still writing
for when there was war in heaven, he produced a new epic about the
battle of the shades of the heroes,[343] which Lucian unfortunately lost
on the way home, and on Lucian’s departure Homer composed a
commemorative epigram which described him as dear to the blessed
gods.[344]
Lucian introduces Homer’s characters into his scenes. Achilles is one of
the most honored heroes on the Island of the Blessed, serving as joint
judge with Theseus at the Games of the Dead.[345] Helen is the leading
lady in the court-room scene where Rhadamanthus had to decide whose wife
she should be in Elysium. She has forgiven Stesichorus for saying she
caused the Trojan War.[346] But she creates a new scandal by trying to
desert Menelaus again in an elopement with Scintharus’ son.[347] Calypso
on receiving Odysseus’ letter from Lucian’s hand weeps as she reads that
he always regretted giving up his life with her, and then with true
feminine curiosity asks how Penelope is looking now and whether she is
as wise as Odysseus used to boast. Lucian made such replies as he
thought would gratify her![348]
Minor episodes are reminiscent of the Odyssey. Rhadamanthus gives Lucian
a talisman of mallow as Hermes gave Odysseus the moly.[349] To the Land
of Dreams Lucian must erect four gates in place of Homer’s two, one of
horn, one of ivory.[350] And the Singing Sirens that tried to beguile
Odysseus have been metamorphosed into fair young ladies in long chitons
which conceal the legs of she-asses.[351] But whatever changes are made
in the source-material taken from the Odyssey, Lucian’s gentle raillery
does not hide his admiration of great Homer. He gives the lie to the
myth that Homer was blind.[352] And in the contest of the poets at the
Games of the Dead in the Island of the Blessed, he ironically makes
Hesiod the victor though he affirms that in truth Homer was by far the
best of poets.
Lucian’s style in his _True History_ illustrates many of his own
criteria for writing history. The short preface is in proportion to the
short two-book _True History_. The narrative is concise, rapid, lucid
and shows consistent progress, one event following naturally and quickly
upon another without extravagant use of details. The few speeches are
short, lively and suited to the character of the speaker. The
descriptions are realistic and pointed. Extraordinary stories are told
simply with an appearance of veracity.
A few typical elements of the Greek Romances appear in the _True
History_. There is a suggestion of a court-room scene where Rhadamanthus
judges Helen’s accomplices in escape. One letter is inserted, Odysseus’
to Calypso, for the purpose of ironic satire of Homeric characters. An
inscription on bronze is discovered and a laudatory couplet in hexameter
is composed and inscribed on stone. But love and religion, the commonest
themes of the Greek Romances, are eliminated from this tale of
marvellous adventures.
Satire though this story is, it ranks easily first among imaginary
voyagings both in fantasy and style. In his narration Lucian pours all
his spirit, his liveliness of observation, his brilliant imagination,
his vivacious wit. His own enjoyment in his facile, marvellous
inventions is contagious. As he rushes his breathless readers over the
earth, through the air, under the sea, as he introduces us to
innumerable natural phenomena and monstrous beings, he convinces us that
this world of fantasy is a real world. He has made many others wish to
record similar travels, for the _True History_ is the model of all those
imaginary voyages with which Rabelais, Cyrano de Bergerac, Swift,
Voltaire and others amused their contemporaries. No work of Lucian found
so many imitators as this.[353]
The readers of Lucian’s _True History_ on finishing it feel that they
have drunk with him more from his eternal springs of joy and laughter
than from his irony, in fact that his irony gives only a few drops of
angostura bitters to the heady cocktails of his wit. And at the end the
readers of this romance are ready today to salute the shade of Lucian as
Andrew Lang did:[354]
“In what bower, oh Lucian, of your rediscovered Islands Fortunate are
you now reclining; the delight of the fair, the learned, the witty,
and the brave?...
“There, among the vines that bear twelve times in the year, more
excellent than all the vineyards of Touraine, while the song-birds
bring you flowers from vales enchanted, and the shapes of the Blessed
come and go, beautiful in wind-woven raiment of sunset hues; there, in
a land that knows not age, nor winter, midnight, nor autumn, nor noon,
where the silver twilight of summer-dawn is perennial, where youth
does not wax spectre-pale and die; there, my Lucian, you are crowned
the Prince of the Paradise of Mirth.”
It may seem anti-climax to turn from the _True History_ to Lucian’s
other romance, the _Metamorphoses_, for the second exists only in an
epitome by another hand. Since however this epitome is included in all
the best manuscripts and has been proved conclusively by B. E. Perry to
be a condensation of an original _Metamorphoses_ by Lucian on the basis
of spirit, vocabulary, syntax and phraseology, we must try to form some
idea of this other romance.[355]
As the _True History_ is a satire of travellers’ tales, this epitome,
_Lucius or Ass_, is primarily a satire of magic and magic rites. Just as
in the _True History_ not only epic poets and historians were parodied,
but philosophers came in for their share of ironic comment, so in
_Lucius or Ass_ satire is directed not merely against magicians, but
also against corrupt priests and frail women. The satire is of the
earth, earthy, very near the folk-story from which it may have
originated. _Lucius or Ass_ is Everyman in his credulity, gullibility
and bestiality. The only heroines in his murky world are a witch-woman
and a corrupt maid. This epitome has two great values: it gives us some
idea of Lucian’s lost _Metamorphoses_, and hence affords a basis for
comparison with Apuleius’ great Latin novel _Metamorphoses_. It will
prove convenient I hope, to have a rather full outline presented here in
English for purposes of discussion and comparison. This Greek _Lucius or
Ass_ like the _True History_ is written in the first person, but Lucius
of Patrae, the hero, not the author, is the narrator. In my brief
résumé, I have found it clearer to write Lucius’ account in the third
person.
Once upon a time on a journey to Thessaly Lucius inquires of some fellow
travellers whereabouts in the city of Hypata a man named Hipparchus
lives, for he is carrying a letter of introduction to him. On his
arrival he stays at Hipparchus’ house. Only his wife and a maid
Palaestra lived with him. On his host’s inquiring the object of his
travels, Lucius says he is on his way to Larissa. He conceals the fact
that he is searching for women who deal in magic. While walking around
the city, he meets an old friend of his mother named Abroea, who warns
him against the wife of Hipparchus because she is a witch. Lucius,
delighted with this news, returns to Hipparchus’ house and in the
absence of his host and hostess makes love to Palaestra with the purpose
of persuading the maid to acquaint him with her mistress’ magic powers.
At the close of a night of revel, Lucius persuades Palaestra to show him
her mistress at her magic rites.
A few nights later Palaestra fulfills her promise by leading Lucius at
dead of night to the door of her lady’s bedroom where through a crack he
can watch her proceedings. She mutters to her lamp. She strips. She rubs
her naked body with ointment from a little box. Gradually she is
transformed into an owl and flies away to her lover. Lucius then
prevails upon Palaestra to let him attempt the same transformation. By
ill luck the maid brings him the wrong box of ointment so that he is
changed not into a bird, but into an ass. Palaestra soothingly assures
him that the antidote is simple, just a meal of roses, and if her
dearest will pass the night quietly in the stable, in the morning she
will gather the flowers and recover her Lucius.
But this simple plan gangs a-gley, for in the night robbers raid the
house, secure much booty and to carry it steal also the horse and the
real ass of Hipparchus and Lucius. So the man-ass, heavily burdened, is
driven to the robbers’ home. One old woman is their care-taker. Several
days later the robbers return from one of their forays bringing in as
booty a young woman whom they have kidnapped. Later on in the absence of
the brigands the girl tries to escape riding on the ass, but both are
captured by the robbers. On their return, they find that the old woman
in terror has hanged herself.
The robbers plan a dreadful punishment for the culprits: to kill the
ass, disembowel him and sew the girl up alive in his paunch to die by
slow torture. But before they achieve this horror, a company of soldiers
arrives, captures the whole band and carries them off to a magistrate.
They had been conducted to the robbers’ den by the fiancé of the girl.
He now escorts her home on the honored ass Lucius.
After the wedding of the happy pair, the bride persuades her father to
reward the ass her benefactor so he is to be turned out into pasture
with the she-asses. But the servant to whom the care of the ass is
intrusted wickedly takes him home and makes him labor first in a mill,
then carrying fagots on a steep mountain, where a cruel driver mistreats
him. In the midst of his sufferings, news comes that the bride and groom
have been drowned on the seashore. So since their new masters are dead,
the servants all flee, taking the ass with them. They sell him in a city
of Macedonia to a eunuch priest of a Syrian goddess. In his life with
the priests, Lucius is so horrified by their impure practices that he
brays loudly in protest. The noise brings up some passing peasants who
go off to tell the village the obscenities they have witnessed. The
priests have to flee for their lives, but first they nearly kill the ass
by beating him for his braying.
Lucius is in danger of his life again at the house of a rich man where
they stop. For the servants who have lost the meat of a wild ass which
was to be the dinner (the dogs stole it), plot to kill Lucius and serve
up his flesh. He saves himself only by running away from the cook. The
priests are now arrested because they are found in possession of a
golden phiale which they stole from a temple, and the ass is sold to a
baker. In the mill Lucius is so worn down by the hard work that he is
sold as worthless to an old gardener. On the way to town, this gardener
has a quarrel with a soldier and nearly kills him so the gardener and
the ass have to go into hiding. Stupid Lucius betrays their hiding place
by putting his head out of an upper window to see what is going on.
Captured he is given to the soldier, but he soon sells him to a cook.
Now Lucius fattens on good food by surreptitious filching of choice
portions which the cook and his brother had reserved for themselves. By
a little detective work the brothers discover that the thief is the ass.
They show him eating men’s food to their master, who promptly buys the
ass, has a servant train him to act like a man (easy lessons for
Lucius!) and exhibits him for admission fees. A woman buys a night with
him and has intercourse with him.
Then his master purposes to exhibit him couched with a woman (a
condemned criminal) at a public festival. The scene is all set when some
one comes up to Lucius and the woman at the banquet table bearing, among
other flowers, roses. At last the ass has his meal of restorative
flowers and becomes once more Lucius. He appeals to the magistrate for
protection against those who cry he is a magician and must be killed. He
informs the governor that his name is Lucius, he has a brother Gaius,
both have the same two other names; that he himself is a writer of
stories and his brother is an elegiac poet and a good prophet. The
magistrate believing his story gives him hospitality. Lucius’ brother
comes to take him home, but first Lucius thought it fitting to call on
the woman who had given him her love when he was an ass. He is chagrined
to find that as a man he has no charm for her! He sails with his brother
to Patrae and there sacrifices to the gods who have saved him.
No other work attributed to Lucian has aroused greater controversy than
_Lucius or Ass_. All the literature about it is reviewed in Ben Edwin
Perry’s epoch-making book _The Metamorphoses Ascribed to Lucius of
Patrae_, which conclusively proves that _Lucius or Ass_ is an epitome of
Lucian’s _Metamorphoses_, made by another writer. Perry analyzes
Photius’ description of the lost Greek _Metamorphoses_ with its theory
of the three versions of the ass-story,[356] and proves that Photius’
one mistake was in thinking that the name Lucius of Patrae referred to
an author of a third _Metamorphoses_, which was probably the original of
Lucian’s and Apuleius’ stories: Lucius of Patrae in _Lucius or Ass_ is
the hero-narrator, not the author. Perry then with convincing logic
reconstructs the probable content of the _Metamorphoses_ of which
_Lucius or Ass_ is an epitome and with the same irrefutable reasoning
discusses the nature of this original Greek novel. The basis of it was a
folk-lore story of a transformation. The style was plain, the narrative
rapid, the tone ironic. The narrator keeps the character of the hero of
the adventures and never identifies himself with the author. The
character of the hero is that of “an unique clown” with an absorbing and
credulous interest in strange phenomena especially transformations. The
final proof that the _Metamorphoses_ was satirical is “the simple fact
that the _Eselmensch_ is a litterateur and an investigator of marvels.”
“The generic title shows that the author regarded his story as a kind of
commentary on the subject of metamorphoses, and writers who interested
themselves in such things.”[357]
This author, “second century Atticist, humorist, and satirist,” can be
none other than Lucian himself, for the Greek _Metamorphoses_ is
Lucianic in type, is a relaxation from serious work as is the _True
History_; it shows the same satire of credulity that other works of
Lucian (for example the _Alexander_) did; and it is colored by the same
ironic humor. The epitome contains a striking Lucianic element although
this is overlaid by philological errors. Perry also analyzes
resemblances and differences between the reconstructed _Metamorphoses_
of Lucian and Apuleius’ novel, but this discussion I shall reserve for
the next chapter.
_Lucius or Ass_ is valuable in proving that Lucian wrote not one but two
romances; that in both he developed a new type of romance, the satiric;
that in each he maintained the same great qualities which mark his other
writings: the quest for truth, intolerance of fraud and credulity; keen
observation and realistic description; condensation, rapidity, clarity;
dramatic irony. The two romances also show more than any other of
Lucian’s writings his brilliant imaginative powers.
A postscript to this discussion of Lucian’s satiric romances may well
include an account of a novel in miniature which appears in one of his
dialogues. Writing in the second century he was of course thoroughly
familiar with the conventional type of the Greek romance. Though this
statement might be accepted _a priori_, certain evidence of it is
furnished by his insertion in his _Toxaris_ of an epitome of a Scythian
romance of love and adventure. The _Toxaris_ is a Platonic dialogue
written probably about A.D. 165, in Lucian’s period of transition from
purely rhetorical writings to those of moral or religious satire.[358]
In it a Greek Mnesippus and a Scythian Toxaris discuss friendship each
giving five illustrations of famous instances in his own country. The
longest one related is a Scythian romance told by Toxaris.[359]
Rostovtzeff has shown that Lucian probably had in his hands a Greek
romance with a Scythian background, for papyri fragments furnish
incontrovertible evidence of a similar Scythian romance in Greek dating
from the second century A.D.[360]
The story as told by Lucian is melodramatic. It relates the devotion of
three Scythians, Macentes, Lonchates and Arsacomas, who had pledged to
each other friendship for life and death in the old Scythian way of
shedding some of their blood into a cup and quaffing it together. Now
Arsacomas, who had gone on a mission to Leucanor, king of Bosporus,
there fell madly in love at first sight with his daughter Mazaea. At a
banquet when suitors were bidding for the hand of the princess with
proud lists of their possessions, all Arsacomas could boast of was his
two fair, brave friends. The Bosporans laughed him to scorn and the girl
was awarded to Adyrmachus, who the next day was to convey his bride to
the land of the Machlyans.
The outraged Arsacomas rushing home told his friends how he and their
friendship had been ridiculed and the three as one man planned immediate
vengeance. Lonchates promised to bring Arsacomas the head of Leucanor.
Macentes was to kidnap the bride. Arsacomas was to stay at home and
raise an army on the ox-hide for the war that would surely follow. All
proceeded according to schedule. Arsacomas slew an ox, cut up and cooked
the meat, spread the hide on the ground and sat on it with his hands
held behind him. This is the greatest appeal for aid possible for a man
who desires to secure help for vengeance. His friends and kinsmen coming
accepted each a portion of the meat, set right foot on the hide and
pledged as much aid as he could. So a goodly army was raised.
Lonchates went to Bosporus, pretending he had come as a friend to offer
aid against Arsacomas’ planned invasion. King Leucanor alarmed by the
news of an imminent Scythian attack was lured alone into the temple of
Ares to take a secret oath of friendship with Lonchates. There Lonchates
murdered him, cut off his head and escaped with it under his cloak
before the guards outside knew what had happened.
Macentes too used subterfuge, for hurrying to the Machlyans he reported
King Leucanor’s death, said falsely that the Bosporans called Adyrmachus
as his son-in-law to be their king, and offered while Adyrmachus rode at
full speed to them, to escort after him his bride Mazaea in the
wagon-train, for she, he claimed, was a relative of his own. This plan
worked so smoothly that Macentes, when night came on, took Mazaea from
her carriage, put her on his horse with himself and galloped off with
her to Arsacomas. The horse dropped dead at the end but the kidnapped
bride was delivered. Then all three friends united in the battle against
Adyrmachus, slew him on the field, and by nightfall had won a victory.
The next day peace was negotiated. Such are the deeds of daring which
Scythians perform for their friends.
In the papyrus fragments a lady in distress is weeping and lamenting in
the tent of a general Eubiotus. He clears his tent because of her woe,
hears her declare that she wishes she had never seen Eraseinus
(apparently her lover) and prevents her attempted suicide by wresting
her sword from her. She then tells Eubiotus that she is not the Amazon
Themisto though she is so disguised, but a Greek girl Calligone. Here
the fragments end. The only points in common with Lucian’s story are the
geographical background and the name Eubiotus (in Lucian the
illegitimate brother of Leucanor and an aspirant to his throne),[361]
but both stories as Rostovtzeff points out look to history for
characters and setting as the Ninus Romance did.
In the _Toxaris_ the coloring is only quasi-historical through the
mention of names of kings and their lineage: the story is not history,
but an historical novel. And the connection of the Scythians with the
Sarmatians, the Alans, the Maeotians and the Bosporans corresponds only
in part with their actual relations at the time. The Sauromatians are a
relic of the past; the Alans represent actual conditions in the time of
the author. The geographical coloring is likewise only partly
historical. The picture of the Scythians even with its tendency to
idealization represents the people fairly. They are nomadic, poor, with
a free democratic political organization without kings, and they are
warriors. Their gods are the sword and the wind. Their customs are
primitive. They make war on their neighbors and have special relations
with the Greek states on the Bosporus and Olbia and visit those on the
south side of the Black Sea.
Lucian in composing his _Toxaris_ probably had in hand a Greek romance
with a Scythian background, containing certain historical and
ethnographical material. This he worked over making his story represent
what his public then knew or could know of the Scythians and their
neighbors. The discovery of the papyrus fragments of the Calligone novel
confirms this thesis.[362] The type of the _Toxaris_ story and the
papyrus story is the same. Both were love romances, though in each the
erotic motif is subordinated to adventure. The interest of the age in
the unfamiliar, the strange is manifested in the selection of Scythia
for the background.
Lucian’s narrative is intensely exciting as well as picturesque and
although it is only a miniature story it gives us an idea of another
love romance of a wild type with a king’s head cut off for vengeance, a
bride kidnapped on horseback and an army raised on the ox-hide. The
whole _Toxaris_ indeed, as Croiset remarked,[363] with its ten anecdotes
furnishes rich examples of Lucian’s art of narration.
VIII
_A COMPARISON OF THE GREEK ROMANCES AND APULEIUS’_ METAMORPHOSES
Apuleius, the author of the greatest ancient novel extant, might, if he
had chosen, written his book in Greek instead of Latin. Though he was
born in North Africa (at Madaura) he was educated in Athens as well as
Roman Carthage and Rome, indeed was completely bi-lingual. The letter
from his wife produced as evidence in his trial for having won her
affections by magic was in Greek. And private correspondence
demonstrates fluency in the language even more than does the fact of his
translation of a work by Plato and his Latin style richly colored by
Greek syntax and vocabulary.
Some reader may now ask as Apuleius anticipated: “Who is this man?”[364]
So I must refer all to my other writings about him and briefly
characterize him here for the uninformed.[365] Apuleius was born about
A.D. 125 in the Roman colony of Madaura where his father was a leading
citizen and official. He was educated at Carthage, Athens and Rome, was
certainly bi-lingual and probably tri-lingual as he must have known
Punic as well as Latin and Greek. Returning to Africa, he practiced
successfully the art of a sophist, giving public discourses, many of
them impromptu. Specimens of these are extant in a collection of
extracts from his speeches called the _Florida_. He married a wealthy
widow, mother of a university friend at Athens, and was promptly sued by
his in-laws for having gained her hand by magic practices. The brilliant
speech in which he defended himself at Sabrata against their charges,
the _Apologia_, is extant and constitutes his autobiography. St.
Augustine called him a Platonist and he did indeed try to convey Plato’s
ideas to his contemporaries in works on _The God of Socrates_, _Plato
and his Doctrine_ and other lost writings. His fame when he was alive
rested on his oratory and it was so great that he was honored by statues
and made priest of Aesculapius at Carthage. But his undying glory comes
from his novel, the _Metamorphoses_. The date of its composition is
uncertain as indeed are most of the dates of his life. He lived from
about A.D. 125 to A.D. 171, that is, in the time of Antoninus Pius and
Marcus Aurelius. He was therefore a contemporary of Lucian and may have
met him as Walter Pater imagines in _Marius the Epicurean_. What
concerns us here is his novel and its relation to the Greek Romances.
The _Metamorphoses_ of Apuleius is a long story written in eleven books.
It is an ego-romance with Lucius a Greek acting as narrator and hero.
“The plot is simple. The hero Lucius who is greatly interested in
magic is enabled by the aid of the maid-servant of a witch to achieve
transformation. But a mistake in the use of the unguents changes him
not into a bird as he had planned, but into an ass. Although he knows
that the antidote is a meal of roses, he is kept by Fortune from
securing release through long months and meets various adventures
until at last through the aid of the goddess Isis Lucius the Ass
becomes again Lucius the Man.”[366]
The similarity of this plot to that of the Greek _Lucius or Ass_ is
apparent at once. But its unique differences caused by diversification
of anecdotes and long additions become clear as we read the narrative.
Lucius in the beginning was travelling in Thessaly riding his white
horse over the high mountains when he fell in with two other travellers.
One of these as they rode on together related a horrible story of how
his friend Socrates saw a companion murdered by a witch. The scene of
the story was set in Hypata, the very city to which Lucius was going.
And the narrative of it by its effect on Lucius reveals all his
credulity and curiosity about witchcraft.
Lucius was entertained at the house of Milo to whom he brought a letter
of introduction and soon he learned from a relative in Hypata, named
Byrrhaena, that Milo’s wife Pamphile was a witch. Hypata was full of
stories of marvellous happenings and soon Lucius heard another of these
thrillers at a dinner-party given by Byrrhaena. It was the story told by
a guest Tlelyphron of how he watched a corpse for pay and thereby
suffered mutilation of his face by a foul beldam. It was on the way home
from the party that Lucius, jittery and drunk, fought his fatal battle
with three bold robbers who afterwards, at his trial for murder at the
Festival of Risus, god of laughter, were proved to be wine-skins!
Now Lucius was determined to investigate magic rites by personal
experience so he made ardent love to Pamphile’s servant Fotis until the
enamored girl consented to let him peer through a crack in the door of
Pamphile’s bed-room and see her mistress transform herself into an owl.
This marvel witnessed, nothing would satisfy Lucius but to attempt a
similar transformation. Unfortunately Fotis gave him the wrong unguent
for the necessary lubrication of his body and he became not a bird, but
an ass! The careless maid swore that the antidote was simple, merely a
meal of roses, and if he would quietly spend the night in the stable, in
the morning she would bring him a breakfast of the flowers.
Unfortunately before dawn robbers arrived, pillaged the house and stole,
along with Lucius’ own horse and Milo’s ass, Lucius the ass to carry the
plunder. This was the beginning of a long series of adventures for the
man-ass before he could achieve re-transformation.
In the robbers’ hide-out in the mountains Lucius heard the robbers tell
three fine stories of their brave chieftains. There too he saw a band of
robbers bring in a captive beauty Charite and heard her piteous tale of
how she was kidnapped on her wedding-night for ransom. To cheer this
weeping girl the old woman who cooked for the robbers told in their
absence the story of Cupid and Psyche.
An old wives’ tale she called it, but Apuleius lifted the folk-tale to
the realm of the Olympian gods by making it the love romance of Venus’
son Cupid and Psyche, a mortal maid. Venus herself was the cruel
step-mother who tried to separate the lovers and set all sorts of
impossible tasks for Psyche. But the heroine triumphed over every task
by the aid of Cupid’s minions on earth and in air. Finally the king of
heaven, Jupiter himself, called Psyche to his high throne to receive the
gift of immortality and summoned all the great gods and goddesses to
celebrate her nuptials with the god of love himself.
This happy love romance diverted Charite only briefly, but soon her
lover disguised as a robber came and rescued her and after causing the
destruction of all the robber band carried her away with Lucius to
safety. Charite’s story, however, unlike Psyche’s was not to end
happily. For after her marriage to her Tlepolemus, a former suitor
Thrasyllus because of jealousy made way with her husband in a boar hunt,
pretending his death was an accident. Later when the villain was making
ardent love to the widow, the shade of her husband appeared and
recounted his murder at the hands of his friend. Charite by subtle plans
was able to put out Thrasyllus’ eyes for vengeance and then stabbed
herself over her husband’s tomb. Thrasyllus in repentance starved
himself to death.
Lucius the Ass again left to the mercy of Fortune had a series of
degrading adventures which tended to make him a pessimist. He witnessed
the obscene orgies of a lewd band of Syrian priests. He heard four
naughty Milesian Tales of corrupt women: “The Lover under the Tub,” “The
Baker’s Wife,” “The Sandals under the Bed,” “The Fuller’s Wife.” These
Milesian Tales of triangular sex episodes are succeeded in the novel by
another group of tragic stories which stir deeper waters. The first is a
record of the terrible oppression of the poor by an arrogant young
nobleman and how three fine young brothers who went to the defense of
the poor family lost their lives in a noble cause. Then follows a tragic
story of an amorous step-mother and her attempt to poison her
unresponsive step-son. And finally comes the awful narrative of five
murders committed by one sadistic woman. Book Ten concludes with the
plan to display Lucius the ass in obscene union with this condemned
criminal at a public exhibition. To avoid this horror, Lucius ran away
from Corinth to the sea-shore at Cenchreae and there found his
salvation.
For lying asleep on the sea-shore that night he had a vision in the
moonlight of the goddess Isis. In all her refulgent beauty she told him
of herself and gave him hope. For she assured him that at the spring
festival of the launching of her sacred vessel she would give him
certain aid. And indeed it was at that festival in the midst of all its
brilliant pageantry that the priest of Isis offered the ass a garland of
roses and munching them he became man again. No wonder that after that
Lucius had only one desire: to serve his savior.
Night after night he had new visions of the goddess and under the
direction of her priest he fulfilled all the arduous preparations for
the initiation into her rites. Finally one night left alone in her
temple he was vouchsafed that mystic experience which only the elect may
achieve, death, rebirth, revelation.
“I approached the borderland of death, trod the threshold of
Proserpina, was borne through all the elements and returned; at
midnight I saw the sun shining with a brilliant light; I approached
the gods of the nether and the upper world and adored them in person
near at hand.”[367]
After such exaltation Lucius consecrated himself forever to the service
of Isis. Soon going to Rome he continued his worship at her temple there
and by her direction was twice initiated into the mysteries of the god
Osiris though the expense was great for “this poor man of Madaura.”
Under the blessing of Osiris he prospered greatly as an advocate in the
Roman Forum and finally under the god’s direction he was allowed to
become one of the Pastophores or high-priests of the cult. So ends his
metamorphosis and the novel.
Let us now return to the beginning. In the first chapter Apuleius
announced that he is telling a Greek story. The main outline of his plot
is indeed identical with that of the Greek _Lucius or Ass_, which as we
have seen, is an epitome of the Greek _Metamorphoses_ by Lucian.
Apuleius’ novel is clearly later than Lucian’s because of rich and
notable additions to the plot of the epitome _Lucius or Ass_. These
additions are Milesian Tales, the Cupid and Psyche story and the great
eleventh book portraying the worship of Isis, who redeemed Lucius from
ass to human shape.
The change in the tone of telling the whole story is significant for
while the earthy character of the original folk-tale occasionally
appears and there are recurrent glimpses of Lucianic wit and satire,
Apuleius’ _Metamorphoses_ is neither a comic romance nor a satire as
Lucian’s clearly was. Apuleius wrote a serious novel, a sort of
Pilgrim’s Progress of the Ass-Man in his quest for knowledge of marvels.
Whereas Lucian through satire degraded a simple folk-tale, Apuleius
exalted it by making the journeyings of Lucius a search for the
spiritual meaning of life. His hero walks alone. The love romance in his
story, the Cupid and Psyche tale, starts with the Platonic conception of
the relation of Eros and Psyche, Love and the Soul, and therefrom is
lifted to the realm of the Olympian gods. And finally the
retransformation of Lucius is no chance event, but a salvation wrought
out by the mystic worship of Isis.
The subjectivity infused in the plot by these additions is enhanced by
the fact that the hero-narrator Lucius is identified with the author,
implicitly at first in the Preface and in incidental comment of author
to reader; in the last book by the identification of Lucius with “the
poor man of Madaura” so that the whole narrative becomes personal
experience. This fact involves another difference from the structure of
the Greek love romances. The action of these love romances, as Riefstahl
points out,[368] is a “closed” one: in the misfortunes which threaten
the lovers through Fortune, they must always remain faithful to each
other and stout-hearted in order to be re-united. So the circle of the
action is “closed,” for it is a great cycle in the life of the hero
which places him at the end just where he was in the beginning. The
action in Apuleius is “open,” for the hero is bound and pledged to
nothing. He goes through his adventures with a light heart. He does not
need to prove his faith to any one. He does not need to stand up to a
test or even to remain true to himself. He must needs wander, but there
is no set purpose in his journeyings. His sufferings are as spiritual as
corporeal. He is aware too of the misery of others in the world. And in
profound despair he must beg divine aid.
It is absurd to compare the plot of the whole novel with the typical
pattern of the Greek love romances and Fotis with their heroines as
Riefstahl does.[369] The only great human love-story in Apuleius’ main
plot, that of Charite, is a tragedy. It is like the Greek Romances in
being a story of high life and in this too is unique among Apuleius’
novelle. But it is utterly different from the Greek love romances in
structure and tone. The only parallel to them is to be found in the
inset story of Cupid and Psyche. Here the tale is of two young lovers
unhappily separated by the cruelty not of Fortune but of a greater
goddess, Venus herself. And only after the hard testing of one of the
pair, this time the lady, are the two lovers reunited. Thus the
conventional happy ending of the plot is achieved. But for the author’s
philosophical mind such a beautiful story must start with a touch of
Platonic symbolism in the very names of the lovers, Cupid and Psyche,
and must be concluded in high heaven, for only among the immortals may
such perfect happiness be won forever.
From this account of Apuleius’ _Metamorphoses_ it is already clear that
his great novel is a synthesis of various types of Greek Romances. Its
closest parallel is in the Greek _Lucius or Ass_, for the bare outline
of the plot of the first ten books is like that of the Greek work. But
all recent research tends to prove that Lucian’s original
_Metamorphoses_ was satiric in character, therefore very different in
tone from Apuleius’ serious work. So although they share the
characteristics of a romance of adventure, with stories of magic and of
robbers forming principal episodes, the motivation and the aim of the
two romances are utterly different. This difference is emphasized by
Apuleius’ two longest and most startling additions to the plot, the
love-story of Cupid and Psyche and the story of Lucius and Isis.
Apuleius writes a love romance like the Greek only in the story of Cupid
and Psyche. For the episode with Fotis is a sex-story of convenience and
the Milesian Tales added to the plot of _Lucius or Ass_ carry out this
Fotis-motif of sex and lechery.[370] The one long love-story of human
beings, Charite’s story, is indeed a love romance of a noble lady and
her noble lord, but it is a complete tragedy in episodes, tone and
ending. Only the Cupid and Psyche story is the true type of Greek love
romances.
The third great interest in the Greek Romances besides adventure and
love was religion. To this Apuleius gave a new emphasis and a new
importance. In the center of his novel in the inset story of Cupid and
Psyche he pictures the old familiar Olympian gods in their conventional
mythological characters, but as realistically and with as implicit a
satire as Lucian used in his “Dialogues of the Gods.” Venus is a very
jealous and cruel step-mother. Jupiter is a lusty, amorous, irresistible
king. Cupid is at first undutiful, mischievous and wanton. The story of
Lucius and Isis is, however, a serious story of a great religious
experience. Through prayer, visions, priestly instruction, ceremonials,
initiation and communion Apuleius becomes one with the goddess to whom
he is to devote the rest of his life. The worship of Isis is pictured
spiritually from the depths of experience by Apuleius who according to
his own statements had actually been many times initiated in her
cult.[371]
Throughout these three parts of Apuleius’ novel with their successive
emphasis on adventure, love and religion, virtually all the conventional
devices of the Greek Romances are employed. In the stories of adventure
there are rapidly shifting scenes, though in a more limited spatial
area. The Greek love romances lie according to the time of their action
in the geography of the colonies of great Greece or within the
boundaries of the hellenistic-oriental world from Byzantium to Egypt,
from Sicily to Babylon. The action is carried out through long sea
voyages, varied with storms and shipwreck. The wide world, the spatial
separations are overcome only through the faithfulness of the lovers.
The Ass-story takes place in narrower compass, in old Greece between
Patrae, Hypata and Corinth. To Lucian’s geographical set Apuleius adds
Rome. In these two versions of the Ass-story all the life of mankind is
represented concretely and in close perspective. The action concerns
little people living in one locality or for purposes of trade taking
short journeys hither and thither on land.[372] Other conventional
devices in Apuleius’ stories of adventure are the introduction as
important characters of robbers and robber chieftains, narratives with
emphasis on external events, descriptions like that of the robbers’
cave.
In the love-story of Charite the interest centers in a lover and his
lass; both are persons in high life, both are faithful. A dream
furnishes an apparition of the dead husband. But the villainy of a
treacherous friend makes the story a tragedy involving murder and
suicide. The story of Cupid and Psyche, true to the type of the Greek
love romance, starts with a religious beginning, the worship of a mortal
girl Psyche as the goddess of love; is motivated by a Greek oracle;
describes at length the proving of the heroine in tasks imposed by the
will of an unfriendly deity; depicts Psyche’s apparent sleep of death;
and finally consummates a happy ending for the lovers through a saving
god, who is Cupid the hero himself. A pastoral note which affiliates the
story with _Daphnis and Chloe_ is introduced by the presence of the
friendly god Pan, who acts as a wise old adviser and comforter to Psyche
in her great despair. And the conventional use of _excursus_ creates a
new pictorial character in brilliant descriptions of Venus charioted
over the sea, of the Palace of Cupid, of Cupid asleep, of the wedding
banquet of the lovers.
In the story of Lucius and Isis in Book Eleven, many of the conventional
devices of the Greek Romances appear: dreams, epiphanies, religious
festivals, a _dea ex machina_. So in Chariton Aphrodite and Fortune
contend for the control of the lovers; in Xenophon of Ephesus Artemis
and Isis are the two saving goddesses; in Heliodorus Apollo and Isis are
prominent though the philosophies of the Gymnosophists and of the
Neo-Pythagoreans have a share in the plot; in Achilles Tatius Artemis
reigns supreme; in Longus Pan and the Nymphs guide the destinies of the
young lovers. The difference in Apuleius is that the whole quest of the
hero is for some meaning in life and when magic, adventure, mythology
and human amours can not supply it, he finds through conversion a union
with a mystic goddess who sublimates his emotion and absorbs his life
into her service.
The greater subjectivity of the Apuleius’ romance as compared to the
Greek Romances is attained by the aloneness of the hero, his quest and
its implicit meaning, his individual satisfaction. This subjectivity is
intensified by the complete adoption of the ego-narrative. Far more
attention is paid by Apuleius than by the Greek romancers to the
narrator and to his point of view in telling the whole romance. Achilles
Tatius was afterwards to attempt the use of this device of narration in
the first person, but he soon lost sight of the narrator in the
narrative and even at the end he never let him reappear. Lucian adopted
completely the _ich-roman_ form, but, as far as can be known, without
rich characterization of the teller. Apuleius uses to the full the
advantage of having a man-ass as narrator, for his composite hero has a
duplex view-point of man and animal and displays a double humor, of man
and beast. All this keeps the hero-narrator before our eyes and we
become ever more and more interested in the effect of the events
narrated on his inner life and on his final solution of life.
Riefstahl points out that in the Greek love romances there is some
striving after subjectivity in the presentation of external events. The
possibility of expression is not yet rich, but by soliloquies, by
descriptions of emotions, by reflections on events expressed in γνῶµαι
the romancers are working from objective to subjective presentation of
their material. The soul is treated as an individual entity separated
from the body and contrasted to it. On this foundation in the love
romances rests the inner structural arch of spatial separation and
spiritual fidelity. The relation of the objective and the subjective
creates somehow the scale on which all these romances take their place.
The love romances are at the objective end of the scale, the older ones
particularly, dynamic events holding writer and reader spell-bound. In
Longus a peaceful atmosphere is created because there are few exciting
events, little travel, only the study of the development of love in two
adolescents in a quiet pastoral setting, but the expression is not
adequate. Longus senses the dual conception of Eros, in man and in
nature, for the love of the two young shepherds is set in the teeming,
growing life of the outer world, but he does not develop fully this
subtle implication. Achilles Tatius inclines toward the subjective
direction through his attempted use of the ego-narrative. But the
fullest subjective treatment is found in Apuleius. In Achilles Tatius as
in Apuleius, the aim of the hero is a µυστήριον but with him it is the
µυστήριον of love; in Apuleius it is the _sacrorum arcana_.[373] The
powerful cosmic force of love appears only in Apuleius and there it is
embodied in the personality of Isis. The goddess describes herself to
Lucius as “the natural mother of all things, mistress and governess of
all the elements, the initial progeny of worlds, chief of the powers
divine, queen of all that are in hell, the principal of them that dwell
in heaven, manifested above and under one form of all the gods and
goddesses.”[374]
The whole story of Apuleius pictures, according to Riefstahl, the
striving of the individual towards the All. The cosmic Eros has taken
the place of the ancient Greek Eros, who was a terrible power, often
identified with the blind, cruel Τύχη. To this cosmic Eros Apuleius has
given the name of Isis.[375] Riefstahl to be sure pushes too far his
theory of an underlying philosophical content in Apuleius, representing
the romance “as an artistic unit ... and as an issue of the writer’s
intellectual interests and personality,” “ein künstlerisch gestaltetes
Anschauungsbild der existenziellen Lebensgrundlage des
Neuplatonismus.”[376] Yet he does point out astutely the fundamental
difference in Apuleius which makes his _Metamorphoses_ another distinct
type of romance, the subjective philosophical.
A word now in retrospect. By the end of the second century A.D., this
new genre of literature, the romance, had developed to full stature.
Already besides the author of the Ninus romance, Chariton, Lucian and
Apuleius had written their stories, and perhaps also Xenophon of
Ephesus. The different types of romance were already established: the
historical romance, the love romance with its secondary interests of
adventure and religion, satirical romance, the subjective philosophical
romance. The pastoral was soon to be added. That is, in the second
century of our era, a new type of literature was created, a type which
was to be the most popular in the modern world.[377]
It is strange to find that so distinguished and perceptive an historian
as Rostovtzeff in his histories of Rome does not recognize the
significance for the early empire of this new literary form. In
describing the second century, he writes:[378]
“Except for the troubled reign of Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Empire
under the Antonines enjoyed profound peace, broken only by distant
wars on the frontier. Within the empire life appeared to be, as it had
been in the first century, a steady forward movement for the diffusion
and enrichment of civilization. The creative power of Rome seemed to
have reached its zenith. There was, however, one disquieting symptom:
after the brilliant age of the Flavians we note an almost complete
sterility in literature and art. After Tacitus, and after the artists
who worked for Trajan ... the decades that followed failed to produce
a single great writer or a single notable monument of art....
“Even before the time of war and pestilence in the reign of Marcus
Aurelius, we mark in the whole of intellectual life not merely a pause
but even a backward movement. The only exception is a revival of Greek
rhetorical prose, perfect in form but monotonous in substance. Its
chief representative is the sophist and rhetorician, Aristides, and
his best work is his _Panegyric_ on Rome. The _Dialogues_ of Lucian
are witty and interesting; he was a sceptic and a humorist who mocked
all ideals both new and old. In the West there are only two names to
be quoted, that of the satirist Juvenal, a gloomy and bitter observer
of the dark side of human life, and that of Pliny the Younger, a
shallow orator and a brilliant representative of the epistolary style.
The rest both in Greece and in Italy are writers of handbooks,
text-books, and of miscellaneous collections of entertaining stories
for the amusement and instruction of the reader.”
Rostovtzeff’s omission of all reference to the Greek Romances (even to
Lucian’s) and to Apuleius shows how completely they have been
disregarded. Yet for a picture of the social life of the second and the
third centuries and of the psychology of the men of the time the Greek
Romances and Apuleius are a revelation.
The Roman empire had checked both political activity and oratory, indeed
the orator had been succeeded by the rhetor in Greece and Rome. In the
unified Mediterranean world trade had developed greatly and travellers
had followed traders from one country to another, among them the
lecturing sophists. The new lands visited had their curiosities and
splendors so travellers’ tales multiplied with descriptions often worthy
of a natural history. Men, diverted from the aims of personal ambition
which military conquest or a democratic state had afforded, now sought
release and excitement in the personal relations. Women achieved a new
freedom and a new importance. The emotional life came to have a new
interest and this led to the development of the prose romance.
From the east came, with rich material resources, a wealth of new ideas,
a mingling of superstition, magic, religion and philosophy. Just as
man’s emotions were turned inward so was his thought. The greatest new
adventure became the quest for a solution of life itself. The romances
of the early empire whatever their type reflect the age: its craving for
excitement, its desire for adventure, its dread of brigands, its
curiosity about the new, its interest in art, its wish for fulfillment
of emotion in romantic love, its awareness of unsolved mysteries in man
and the universe. With even the partial re-dating of the Greek Romances
all sorts of subjects open up for investigation such as the apparatus of
religion in the use of oracles, dreams, epiphanies; the interest in
works of art; the new position of women. At any time in the future new
fragments of romances may be discovered, or new dating of some of the
old ones may be made possible. But even now while archaeological
discoveries are suspended and publication of new editions is delayed, we
may read and re-read these amazing old stories and see what escape
literature was in the second and third centuries. The Greek Romances
have much to tell us of the psychology of their authors, their
characters, and their readers. They have a deep human value.
“Homo sum: humani nil a me alienum puto.”