——Je me suis tû cinq ans
Madame, et vais encore me taire plus long tems,
and to give a direct proof of his intention, recites immediately no
less than fifty verses in a breath.
* * * * *
In Voltaire's scruples about unity of place he has committed a
thousand blunders. In the Mort de Cæsar the scene is in the Capitol,
but the people seem not to know their precise situation. On one
occasion Cæsar exclaims, “Courons au Capitole!”
* * * * *
Denis de Sallo's “Journal des Sçavans,” in 1665 may be considered as
the origin of Literary Journals or Reviews.
* * * * *
Sous ce tombeau git Le Sage abattu
Par le ciseau de la Parque importune,
S'il ne fut pas ami de la fortune
Il fut toujours ami de la vertu,
was Le Sage's epitaph.
* * * * *
These lines although extremely French are forcible,
Et comme un jeune cœur est bientot enflammé
Il me vit, il m'aima, je le vis, je l'aimai.
* * * * *
On Cardinal Richelieu, Benserade made the following epitaph:
Cy gist—ouy gist par la mort bleu
Le Cardinal de Richelieu,
Et ce qui cause mon ennuy
Ma pension avec lui.
* * * * *
The Jesuits called Crebillon ‘Puer ingeniosus, sed insignis nebulo.’
* * * * *
Dr. E. Young published “A true Estimate of Human Life, Part I,”
dedicated to Queen Anne, and describing the _shades_ of existence. The
second part, however, which should have contained the lights never
appeared.
* * * * *
The “Batrachomyomachia,” is nothing more than a burlesque poem, much
in the manner of Aristophanes, and doubtfully attributed to Homer.
Philip Melancthon however, wrote a commentary to prove the poet's
object was to excite a hatred for tumults and sedition. Pierre La
Seine going a step farther, thinks the intention was to recommend to
young men temperance in eating and drinking.
* * * * *
“Amare et sapere vix Deo conceditur,” is not Seneca's as generally
supposed.
* * * * *
The heathen poets are mentioned three times in the New Testament.
Aratus in the seventeenth chapter of Acts—Menander in the fifteenth
chapter of I Corinthians—also Epimenides.
* * * * *
“Semper sub Sextis perdita Roma fuit,”
was a line written during the pontificate of Alexander VI. Sextus
Tarquinius provoked by his tyranny the expulsion of the kings of Rome.
Urban VI began the great schism of the West. Alexander VI astonished
the world by the enormity of his crimes, and Pius VI did not falsify
the saying.
* * * * *
A letter was once addressed from Rome “Alla sua Excellenza
Seromfidevi,” in London. It caused much perplexity at the Post-office
and British Museum, and after foiling the acumen of a minister of
state, was found to be intended for Sir Humphrey Davy.
* * * * *
The vulgar Christian era is the invention of Dionysius Exiguus.
* * * * *
The book of Judith was originally written in Chaldee, and thence
translated into Latin by St. Jerom. There are several particulars in
our English version which are not to be found in St. Jerom's, and
which seem to be those readings which he professes to omit as vicious
corruptions.
* * * * *
The proverb, “Evil communications corrupt good manners,” which is
found in Corinthians, is a quotation, intended as such, from
Euripides.
* * * * *
Varro reckons three epochs: the first from the beginning of the world
to the first flood, which he calls _uncertain_; the second from the
flood to the first Olympiad, _fabulous_; the third from the first
Olympiad to his own time, _historical_.
* * * * *
Politian, the poet and scholar, was an admirer of Alessandra Scala,
and addressed to her this extempore:
To teach me that in hapless suit
I do but waste my hours,
Cold maid, whene'er I ask for fruit,
Thou givest me naught but flowers.
* * * * *
In the Latin version of Herodotus, the lowest of the towers forming
the temple of Belus, is said to be a furlong thick and a furlong high;
and some writers concluding each of the eight to be as high, make the
whole one mile in height. In the Greek text, however, the lowest tower
is merely said to be a furlong _through_—nothing is said of its
height. Strabo makes the temple a furlong altogether in altitude.
* * * * *
Jacobus Hugo was of opinion that by the Harpies Homer intended the
Dutch; by Euenis, John Calvin; by Antinous, Martin Luther; and by the
Lotophagi, Protestants in general.
* * * * *
{581} “Impune quæ libet facere id est esse regem,” is a definition of
a king to be found in Sallust.
* * * * *
The first collection of the Iliad was by Pisistratus, or some of the
Pisistratidæ. There were, after this, innumerable editions—but
Aristarchus in the reign of Ptolemy Philometer, B.C. 150, published
from a collection of all the copies then existing, a new edition, the
text of which has finally prevailed.
* * * * *
Some one after the manner of Santeuil, composed the following quatrain
for the gates of the market to be erected on the site of the famous
Jacobin Club at Paris,
Impia tortorum longas hic turba furores
Sanguinis innocui, non satiata, aluit.
Sospite nunc patriâ, fracto nunc funeris antro,
Mors ubi dira fuit, vita salusque patent.
* * * * *
A version of the Psalms was published in 1642 by William Slatyer, of
which this is a specimen:
The righteous shall his sorrow scan
And laugh at him, and say ‘Behold!
What hath become of this here man
That on his riches was so bold.’
* * * * *
At the bottom of an obelisk which Pius VI was erecting at great
expense near the entrance of the Quirinal Palace in 1783, while the
people were suffering for bread, were found written these words,
Signore, di a questa pietra che divenga pane.
Lord, command that these stones be made bread.
* * * * *
Constantine Koliades wrote a book to prove that Homer and Ulysses were
one and the same—but Joshua Barnes attributes the authorship of the
Iliad to Solomon.
* * * * *
In Σ. xviii. 192, of the Iliad, Achilles says none of the armor of the
chieftains will fit him except the shield of Ajax: how then did his
own armor fit Patroclus?
* * * * *
In the reign of Edward VI, Dr. Christopher Tye turned the Acts of the
Apostles into rhyme. They begin thus,
In the former epistle to thee
Dear friend Theophilus
I have written the veritie
Of the Lord Christ Jesus.
* * * * *
Empedocles professed the system of four elements, and added thereto
two principles which he called ‘principium amicitiæ and principium
contentionis.’ What are these but attraction and repulsion?
* * * * *
The Count Bielfeld's definition of poetry is ‘L'art d'exprimer les
pensées par la fiction.’ The German terms Dichtkunst, _the art of
fiction_, and Dichten to _feign_, which are used for _Poetry_, and _to
make verses_, are in full accordance with his definition.
* * * * *
The Germans have epic poems composed in metre of sixteen and seventeen
syllables.
* * * * *
The following Vaudeville is one of the drollest of its kind:
Quand un bon vin meuble mon estomac
Je suis plus savant que Balzac—
Plus sage que Pibrac.
Mon bras seul faisant l'attaque
De la nation Cossaque
La mettroit au sac.
De Charon Je passerois le lac
En dormant dans son bac.
J'irois au fier Eac
Sans que mon cœur fit tic ni tac
Présenter du tabac.
* * * * *
On ancient monuments are often found the letters A. E. R. A. meaning
Annus erat Regni Augusti. The ignorance of copyists may probably have
formed of these letters the single word ÆRA. Would it not be a better
derivation than the Latin ÆS?
* * * * *
The work of John Albert Fabricius, the Hamburg professor, entitled
Bibliotheca Græca, in which his sole object is to render an account of
the _Greek_ authors _extant_, occupies fourteen thick volumes in
quarto.
* * * * *
The usual derivation of the word Metaphysics is not to be sustained.
_Meta physicam_ is tortured into meaning _super physicam_, and the
science is supposed to take its name from its superiority to physics.
The truth is, that Aristotle's treatise on Morals is next in
succession to his Book of Physics, and this order he considers the
rational order of study. His Ethics consequently commence with the
words Μετα τα φυσικα, &c. from which the word Metaphysics.
* * * * *
The commentators upon Mr. Beckford's Vathek say that the _locusts_
derive their name from having been so called by the first English
settlers in America. The word comes evidently from _loco usto_, the
havoc they made wherever they passed leaving the appearance of a place
desolated by fire.
* * * * *
M. Patru was convinced that in all his prose writings no sentence or
part of a sentence could be found so _cadenced_ as to form a verse. A
friend, however immediately pointed out to him the words in his
‘Plaidoyers’
Septième plaidoyer pour un jeune Allemand.
* * * * *
Despreaux speaking of the cæsura in French versification, asserts,
Que toujours dans nos vers—le sens coupant les mots,
Suspende l'hemistiche—en marquant le repos.
M. Despreaux seems to have forgotten that hemistich is a composite
Greek word signifying a demi-line, and that consequently his own
admired verses have no meaning at all.
* * * * *
Every one is acquainted with the excellent _commencement_ of the
Annals of Tacitus. From this, principally he has acquired his
reputation for concision. It is singular that no notice has ever been
taken of the extreme prolixity of their _conclusion_.
* * * * *
There is a dissertation upon Hebrew, or Samaritan medals by Père
Soucier, in which he proves the existence of Hebrew money struck by
the Jews upon the model of the coins current before the captivity. All
the Hebrew medals, however, bearing a head of Moses or of Christ, are
manifestly forgeries.
* * * * *
{582} There is a book by a Jesuit, Père Labbe, entitled La
Bibliothèque des Bibliothèques. It is a catalogue of all authors in
all nations who have written catalogues of books.
* * * * *
Lucretius, lib. v. 93, 96, has the words,
——terras—
Una dies dabit exitio.
Ovid the lines,
Carmine sublimis tunc sunt peritura Lucreti
Exitio terras cum dabit una dies.
* * * * *
Albert in his Hebrew Dictionary, pretends to discover in each word, in
its root, in its letters, and in the manner of pronouncing them, the
reason of its signification. Loescher in his treatise De causis Linguæ
Hebreæ, carries the matter even farther.
* * * * *
In Judges is this expression, ‘And he smote them hip and thigh with a
great slaughter.’ The phrase ‘to smite hip and thigh’ arises from
these words. No meaning, however, can be attached to them as they
stand—but the original will admit of a different signification, viz:
‘He smote them with his leg on the thigh,’ and alludes to the
wrestling matches which were common in the east. In this sense the
phrase exactly answers to the ‘crus femori impingere’ and the
σκελιξειν or αποσκελιξειν of the ancients.
* * * * *
It is a remarkable fact, that during the whole period of the middle
ages, the Germans lived in utter ignorance of the art of writing.
* * * * *
The silver shekel of the Hebrews has on its face the rod of Aaron with
the inscription, Jeruschalaim Hakkedoucha, Jerusalem the Holy, and on
the reverse a cup with the words Chekel Ischrael, money of Israel.
* * * * *
The Masoretical punctuation is a kind of critique upon the Hebrew text
invented by the Jewish teachers to prevent its alteration. The first
original being lost, recourse was had to the Masore as an infallible
method of fixing the text. The verses, words, and even letters are
there counted, and all their variations recorded.
* * * * *
Among the Hebrew text of the Old Testament are mingled a few passages
of Chaldaic. _All the characters_ as we have them now, are properly
speaking Chaldaic.
* * * * *
A version of the Psalms in 1564, by Archbishop Parker, has the
following—
Who sticketh to God in stable trust
As Sion's mount he stands full just
Which moveth no whit, nor yet can reel,
But standeth for ever as stiff as steel.
* * * * *
A part of the 137th Psalm runs thus: ‘If I forget thee, O Jerusalem,
may my right hand forget her cunning, and may my tongue cleave to the
roof of my mouth,’ which has been thus paraphrased in a version of the
Psalms,
If I forget thee ever
Then let me prosper never,
But let it cause
My tongue and jaws
To cling and cleave together.