REVIEW OF THE FIRST PERIOD.
The poetic literature reviewed in the last five chapters is the product
of the second century B.C. The latest writers of any importance
belonging to the earlier period of the poetry of the Republic were
Lucilius and Afranius. Half a century from the death of Lucilius
elapsed before the appearance of the poems of Lucretius and Catullus,
which come next to be considered. But before passing on to this
more familiar ground, a few pages may be devoted to a retrospect of
some general characteristics marking the earlier period, and to a
consideration of the social and intellectual conditions under which
literature first established itself at Rome.
With striking individual varieties of character, the poets whose works
have been considered present something of a common aspect, distinct
from that of the literary men of later times. They were placed in
different circumstances, and lived in a different manner from either
the poets who adorned the last days of the Republic or those who
flourished in the Augustan age. The spirit animating their works was
the result of the forces acting on the national life, and the form
and style in which they were composed were determined by the stage of
culture which the national mind had reached, and the stage of growth
through which the Latin language was passing under the stimulus of that
culture.
Like nearly all the literary men of later times, these poets were of
provincial or foreign birth and origin. They were thus born under
circumstances more favourable to, or at least less likely to repress,
the expansion of individual genius, than the public life and private
discipline of Rome. Their minds were thus more open to the reception of
new influences; and their position as aliens, by cutting them off from
an active public career, served to turn their energies to literature.
Their provincial birth and Greek education did not, however, check
their Roman sympathies, or prevent them from stamping on their writings
the impress of a Roman character.
While, like many of the later poets, they came originally as strangers
to Rome, unlike them, they seem to have in later years, resided
habitually within the city. The taste for country life prevailing
in the days of Cicero and of Horace was not developed to any great
extent in the times of Ennius or Lucilius. The great Scipio, indeed,
retired to spend the last years of his life at Liternum; and Cicero
mentions the boyish delight of Laelius and the younger Africanus in
escaping from the public business and the crowded streets of Rome to
the pleasant sea-shore of Caieta[332]. Accius seems to have possessed a
country farm, and Lucilius showed something of a wandering disposition,
and possessed the means to gratify it. But most of these writers
were men of moderate means; nor had it then become the practice of
the patrons of literature to bestow farms or country-houses on their
friends. By their circumstances, as well as the general taste of their
time, they were thus brought almost exclusively into contact with the
life and business of the city; and their works were consequently more
distinguished by their strong sense and understanding than by the
passionate or contemplative susceptibility which characterises the
great eras of Latin literature.
It is remarkable that nearly all the early poets lived to a great age,
and maintained their intellectual vigour unabated to their latest
years; while of their successors none reached the natural term of human
life, and some among them, like many great modern poets, were cut off
prematurely before their promise was fulfilled. The finer sensibility
and more passionate agitation of the poetic temperament appear, in some
cases, to exhaust prematurely the springs of life; while, in natures
more happily balanced, or formed by more favourable circumstances, the
gifts of genius are accompanied by stronger powers of life, and thus
maintain the freshness of youth unimpaired till the last. The length
of time during which Naevius, Plautus, Ennius, Pacuvius, Accius, and
probably Lucilius, exercised their art suggests the inference, either
that they were men of firmer fibre than their successors, or that they
were braced to a more enduring strength by the action of their age.
As the work of men writing in the fulness of their years, the serious
poetry of the time appealed to the mature sympathies of manhood; and
even the comic poetry of Plautus deals with the follies of youth in a
genial spirit of indulgence, tempered by the sense of their absurdity,
such as might naturally be entertained by one who had outlived them.
But perhaps the most important condition determining the original
scope of Roman poetry was the predominance in that era of public over
personal interests. Like Virgil and Horace, most of the early poets
were men born in comparatively a humble station; yet by their force
of intellect and character they became the familiar friends of the
foremost men in the State. But while the poets of the Augustan age
owed the charm of their existence to the patronage of the great, the
earlier poets depended for their success mainly on popular favour. The
intimacy subsisting between the leaders of action and of literature
during the second century B.C. arose from the mutual attraction of
greatness in different spheres. The chief men in the Republic obtained
their position by their services to the State, and thus the personal
attachment subsisting between them and men of letters was a bond
connecting the latter with the public interest. The early poetry of the
Republic is not the expression of an educated minority keeping aloof
from public life. If it is animated by a strong aristocratic spirit,
the reason is that the aristocratic spirit was predominant in the
public life of Rome during that century.
In this era, more than in any later age, the poetry of Rome, like
that of Greece in its greatest eras, addressed itself to popular and
national, not to individual tastes. The crowds that witnessed and
applauded the representations of tragedy as well as comedy, afford a
sufficient proof that the reproduction of Greek subjects and personages
could be appreciated without the accomplishment of a Greek education.
The popularity of the poem of Ennius is attested by his own language,
as well as by the evidence of later writers. The honour of a public
funeral awarded to Lucilius, implies the general appreciation with
which his contemporaries enjoyed the verve, sense, and moral strength
which secured for his satire the favour of a more refined and critical
age.
This general popularity is an argument in favour of the original spirit
animating this early literature. It implies the power of embodying some
sentiment or idea of national or public interest. Thus Roman tragedy
appears to have been received with favour, chiefly in consequence
of the grave Roman tone of its maxims, and the Roman bearing of its
personages. The epic poetry of the age did not, like the Odyssey,
relate a story of personal adventure, but unfolded the annals of the
State in continuous order, and appealed to the pride which men felt,
as Romans, in their history and destiny. The satire of Lucilius was
not intended merely to afford amusement by ridiculing the follies
of social life, but played a part in public affairs by political
partisanship and antagonism, and maintained the traditional standard of
manners and opinions against the inroads of foreign influences. Latin
comedy, indeed, was a more purely cosmopolitan product. The plays of
Terence especially would affect those that listened to them simply as
men and not as Roman citizens. But that of Plautus abounded in the
humour congenial to the Italian race, and owed much of its popularity
to the strong Roman colouring spread over the Greek outlines of his
representations.
The national character of this poetry is attested also by the spirit
and character which pervades it. Among all the authors who have been
reviewed, Ennius alone possessed in a large measure that peculiar
vein of imaginative feeling which is the most impressive element in
the great poets of a later age. The susceptibility of his mind to the
sentiment that moulded the institutions and inspired the policy of the
Imperial Republic, entitles him to rank as the truest representative
of the genius of his country, notwithstanding his apparent inferiority
to Plautus in creative originality. The glow of moral passion, which
is another great characteristic of Latin literature, as it was of the
best types of the Latin race, reveals itself in the remains of all
the serious writers of the age. The struggle between the old Roman
self-respect and the new modes of temptation, is exemplified in the
antagonistic influence exercised by the tragic, epic, and satiric
poetry on the one hand, and the comedy of Plautus and Terence on the
other. The more general popularity of comedy was a symptom of the
facility with which the severer standard of life yielded to the new
attractions. The graver writers, equally with the writers of comedy,
shared in the sceptical spirit, or the religious indifference, which
was one of the dissolving forces of social and political life during
this age. The strong common sense which characterised all the writers
of the time, could not fail to bring them into collision with the
irrational formalism of the national religion; while the distaste for
speculative philosophy which Ennius and Plautus equally express, and
the strong hold which they all have on the immediate interests of life,
explain the absence of any, except the most superficial, reflections on
the more mysterious influences which in the belief of the great Greek
poets moulded human destiny.
The political condition of Rome in the second century B.C. is reflected
in the changes through which her literature passed. For nearly
two-thirds of that century, Roman history seems to go through a stage
of political quiescence, as compared at least with the vigorous life
and stormy passions of its earlier and later phases. But under the
surface a great change was taking place, both in the government and the
social condition of the people, the effects of which made themselves
sufficiently manifest during the last century of the existence of the
Republic. The outbreak of the long gathering forces of discontent and
disorder is as distinctly marked in Roman history, as the outbreak
of the revolutionary forces in modern Europe. The year 133 B.C., the
date of the first tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus, has the same kind of
significance as the year 1789 A.D. Nor is it a mere coincidence that
about the same time a great change takes place in the spirit of Roman
literature. The comedies of Plautus, written in the first years of the
century, while they reflect the political indifference of the mass of
the people, are yet indicative of their general spirit of contentment,
and their hearty enjoyment of life. The epic of Ennius, written a
little later, proclaims the undisputed ascendency of an aristocracy,
still moulded by its best traditions, and claiming to lead a united
people. The remains of Roman tragedy breathe the high spirit of the
governing class, and attest the severer virtue still animating its
best representatives. The comedies of Terence seem addressed to the
taste of a younger generation of greater refinement, but of a laxer
moral fibre than their father's, and of a class becoming separated by
more elaborate culture from ordinary Roman citizens. Expressions in
his prologues[333], however, show that there was as yet no division
between classes arising from political discontent. But in the satire
of Lucilius we read the protest of the better Roman spirit against
the lawless arrogance of the nobles, their incapacity in war, their
corrupt administration of justice, their iniquitous government of the
provinces; against the ostentatious luxury of the rich; the avarice
of the middle classes; the venality of the mob, and the profligacy of
their leaders; and against the insincerity and animosities fostered
among the educated classes by the contests of the forum and the
law-courts.
In passing from the substance and spirit of this early literature to
its form and style, we can see by the rudeness of the more original
ventures which the Roman spirit made, how slowly it was educated by
imitative effort to high literary accomplishment. The only writer
who aimed at perfection of form was Terence, and his success was due
to his close adherence to his originals. But as some compensation
for their artistic defects, these early writers display much greater
productiveness than their literary successors. They were like
the settlers in a new country, who are spared the pains of exact
cultivation owing to the absence of previous occupation of the soil,
and the large extent of ground thus open to their industry. The
contrast between the standard aimed at, and the results attained by the
sincerest literary force in two different eras of Roman literature, is
brought home to the mind by contrasting the rude fragments of the lost
works of Ennius, embodying the results of a long, hearty, active, and
useful life, with the small volume which still preserves the flower of
a few passionate years, as fresh as when the young poet sent it forth:--
Arido modo pumice expolitum.
The style of the early poets was marked by haste, harshness, and
redundance, occasionally by verbal conceits and similar errors of
taste. That of the writers of comedy, on the other hand, is easy,
natural, and elegant. The Latin language seems thus to have adapted
itself to the needs of ordinary social life more readily than to the
expression of elevated feeling. Though many phrases in the fragments
which have been reviewed are boldly and vigorously conceived, few
passages are written with continuous ease and smoothness, and the
language constantly halts, as if inadequate to the meaning which
labours under it. The style has, in general, the merits of directness
and sincerity, often of freshness and vigour, but wants altogether the
depth and richness of colour, as well as the finish and moderation
which we expect in the literature of a people to whom poetry and art
are naturally congenial, and associated with many old memories and
feelings. Their merits of style, such as the simple force with which
they go directly to the heart of a matter, and the grave earnestness
of their tone, are qualities characteristic rather of oratory than of
poetry. But this colouring of their style is very different from the
artificial rhetoric of the literature of the Empire. The oratorical
style of the early poets was the natural result of a sympathy with
the most practical intellectual instrument of their age. The rhetoric
of the Empire was the expression of an artificial life, in which
literature was cultivated to beguile the tedium of compulsory inaction,
and the highest form of public speaking had sunk from its proud office
as the organ of political freedom into a mere exercise of pedants and
school-boys[334].
The same impulse in this age which gave birth to the forms of serious
poetry, stimulated also the growth of oratory and history. While these
different modes of mental accomplishment all acted and reacted on one
another, oratory appears to have exercised the most influence on the
others. Roman literature is altogether more pervaded by oratorical
feeling than that of any other nation, ancient or modern. From the
natural deficiency of the Romans in the higher dramatic and speculative
genius, the rhetorical element entered largely into their poetry, their
history, and their ethical discussions. Cicero identifies the faculties
of the orator with those of the historian and the philosopher. His
treatise _De Claris Oratoribus_ bears witness to the energy with which
this art was cultivated for more than a century before his own time;
and the remains of Ennius and Lucilius confirm this testimony. It was
from the impassioned and dignified speech of the forum and senate-house
that the Roman language first acquired its capacity of expressing
great emotions. All the serious poetry of the age bears traces of this
influence. Roman tragedy shows its affinity to oratory in its grave
and didactic tone. This affinity is further implied in the political
meaning which the audience attached to the sentiments expressed, and
which the actor enforced by his voice and manner. It is also attested
by the fact that in the time of Cicero, famous actors were employed
in teaching the external graces of public speaking. The theatre was
a school of elocution as much as a place of dramatic entertainment.
Cicero specifies among the qualifications of a speaker, 'Vox
tragoedorum, gestus paene summorum actorum.' Although the epic poetry
of the time mainly appealed to a different class of sympathies, yet the
fragments of speeches in Ennius indicate that kind of rhetorical power
which moves an audience by the weight and authority of the speaker.
Roman satire could wield other weapons of oratory, such as the fierce
invective, the lashing ridicule, the vehement indignation which have
often proved the most powerful instruments of debate in modern as well
as ancient times.
Historical composition also took its rise at Rome at this period.
Although the earliest Roman annalists composed their works in the Greek
language, it was not from the desire of imitating the historic art of
Greece that this art was first cultivated at Rome. The origin of Roman
history may be referred rather to the same impulse which gave birth
to the epic poems of Naevius and Ennius. The early annalists were men
of action and eminent station, who desired to record the important
events in which they themselves had taken part, and to fix them for
ever in the annals of their country. History originated at Rome in the
impulse to keep alive the record of national life, not, as among the
Greeks, in the spell which human story and the wonder of distant lands
exercised over the imagination. Its office was not to teach lessons of
political wisdom, but to commemorate the services of great men, and to
satisfy a Roman's pride in the past, and his trust in the future of
his country. The word _annales_ suggests a different idea of history
from that entertained and exemplified by Herodotus and Thucydides.
The purpose of building up the record of unbroken national life was
present to, though probably not realised by, the earliest annalists who
preserved the line of magistrates, and kept account of the religious
observances in the State: in the time of the expansion of Roman power,
this purpose directed the attention of men of action to the composition
of prose annals, and stimulated the productive genius of Naevius and
Ennius: and when, in the Augustan age, the national destiny seemed to
be fulfilled, the same purpose inspired the great epic of Virgil, and
the 'colossal masterwork of Livy.'
Another form of literature, in which Rome became pre-eminent, first
began in this era,--the writing of familiar letters. It was natural
that a correspondence should be maintained among intimate friends
and members of an active social circle, separated for years from one
another by military service, or employment in the provinces; and the
new taste for literature would induce the writers to give form and
finish to these compositions, so that they might be interesting not
only to the persons addressed, but to all the members of the same
circle. The earliest compositions of this kind of which we read,
are the familiar letters in verse ('Epistolas versiculis facetis ad
familiares missas' Cicero calls them) written to his friends by the
brother of Mummius, during the siege of Corinth[335]. That these had
some literary value may be inferred from the fact that they survived
down to the age of Cicero, and are spoken of in the letters to Atticus,
as having often been quoted to him by a member of the family of Mummii.
One of the earliest satires of Lucilius appears to have been a letter
written to Scipio after the capture of Numantia; and several of his
other satires were written in an epistolary form. How happily the later
Romans employed this form in prose and verse is sufficiently proved by
the letters of Cicero and Pliny, and the metrical Epistles of Horace.
This era also saw the beginning of the critical and grammatical
studies which flourished through every period of Roman literature, and
continued long after the cessation of all productive originality. This
critical effort was a necessary condition of the cultivation of art by
the Romans. The perfection of form attained by the great Roman poets of
a later time was no exercise of a natural gift, but the result of many
previous efforts and failures, and of much reflection on the conditions
which had been, with no apparent effort, fulfilled by their Greek
masters. Neither did their language acquire the symmetry, precision,
and harmony, which make it so effective a vehicle in prose and verse,
except as the result of assiduous labour. The natural tendency of the
spoken language was to rapid decomposition. This was first arrested
by Ennius, who cast the literary language of Rome into forms which
became permanent after his time. Among his poetic successors in this
era Accius and Lucilius made critical and grammatical studies the
subjects of some of their works. Lucilius was a contemporary and friend
of the most famous of the early grammarians, Aelius Stilo, the critic
to whom is attributed the saying that 'if the muses were to speak in
Latin, they would speak in the language of Plautus.' Critical works
in trochaic verse were written by Porcius Licinus, and Volcatius
Sedigitus, who appear to have been the chief authorities from whom
later writers derived their information as to the lives of the early
poets. It is characteristic of the want of spontaneousness in Latin
literature, as compared with the fresh and varied impulses which the
Greek genius obeyed in every stage of its literary development, that
reflection on the principles of composition, efforts to form the
language into a more certain and uniform vehicle, and, comment on
living writers, were carried on concurrently with the creative efforts
of the more original minds.
The existing works of the two great writers of Roman comedy have
an acknowledged value of their own, but even the fragments of this
early literature, originally scattered through the works of many
later authors, and collected together and arranged by the industry of
modern scholars, are found to possess a peculiar interest. They recall
the features of the remarkable men by whom the foundations of Roman
literature were laid, and the Latin language was first shaped into
a powerful and symmetric organ. They present the Roman mind in its
earliest contact with the genius of Greece; and they are almost the
sole contemporary witnesses of national character and public feeling
in the most vigorous and interesting age of the Republic. They throw
also much light on the national sources of inspiration in the later
Roman literature. The early poets are seen to be men living the life
of citizens in a Republic, appealing rather to popular taste than to
the sympathies of a refined and limited society; men of mature years
and understanding, animated by a serious purpose and with a strong
interest in the affairs of their time; rude and negligent but direct
and vigorous in speech,--more remarkable for energy, industry, and
common sense, than for the finer gifts and susceptibility of genius.
Their poetry springing from their sympathy with national and political
life, and from the impulses of the will and the manlier energies,
was less rich, varied, and refined than that which flows out of the
religious spirit of man, out of his passions and affections, or of his
imaginative sense of the life and grandeur of Nature. But in these
respects the early poetry was essentially Roman in spirit, in harmony
with the strength and sagacity, the sobriety and grave dignity of Rome.
The accomplished art of the last age of the Republic and of the
Augustan age owed much of its national and moral nourishment to the
vigorous life of this early literature. The earnest enthusiasm of
Ennius was inherited by Lucretius,--his patriotic tones were repeated
by Virgil. The lofty oratory of the Aeneid sometimes sounds like an
echo of the grave and ardent style of early tragedy. The strong sense
and knowledge of the world, the frank communicativeness and lively
portraiture of Lucilius reappeared in the familiar writings of Horace,
while his fierce vehemence and bold invective were reproduced by the
vigorous satirist of the Empire.
[Footnote 332: De Orat. ii. 6.]
[Footnote 333: Adelphi, 18-21:--
'Quom illis placet,
Qui vobis univorsis et populo placent,
Quorum opera in bello, in otio, in negotio
Suo quisque tempore usust sine superbia.'
]
[Footnote 334: Cf. Juv. x. 167:--
'Ut pueris placeas et declamatio fias.'
]
[Footnote 335: Referred to by Mommsen.]
SECOND PERIOD.
THE CLOSE OF THE REPUBLIC.
* * * * *
LUCRETIUS AND CATULLUS.