BIBLIOGRAPHY

The rank is but the guinea's stamp;The man's the gowd for a' that.

We give quotations from this satire in the translation of Francis.

The poet feels justified in addressing it to his patron, because, though Mæcenas is of noble birth himself, he does not hold in contempt the worthy of lowly descent. Horace says that it is all very well to deny a man political advancement on the score of low birth; but when it comes to denying social advancement upon this score to a man of worth, that is quite unbearable. Horace cannot rightly be envied or criticized for his friendship with Mæcenas, for this came to him purely on his merits and not by chance. A pleasing picture is given of his first introduction to Mæcenas, and his final admission to that nobleman's charmed circle of friends.

As for myself, a freedman's son confessed;A freedman's son, the public scorn and jest,That now with you I joy the social hour,—That once a Roman legion owned my power;But though they envied my command in warJustly, perhaps, yet sure 'tis different farTo gain your friendship, where no servile artWhere only men of merit claim a part.Nor yet to chance this happiness I owe;Friendship like yours it had not to bestow.First my best Vergil, then my Varius, toldAmong my friends what character I hold;When introduced, in few and faltering words(Such as an infant modesty affords),I did not tell you my descent was great,Or that I wandered round my country seatOn a proud steed in richer pastures bred;But what I really was I frankly said.Short was your answer, in your usual strain;I take my leave, nor wait on you again,Till, nine months past, engaged and bid to holdA place among your nearer friends enrolled.An honor this, methinks, of nobler kind,That, innocent of heart and pure of mind,Though with no titled birth, I gained his love,Whose judgment can discern, whose choice approve.

The poet here pays a glowing tribute of filial affection to his father, to whose faithful care and instruction he owes it that he has been shielded from the grosser sins and defects of character.

If some few venial faults deform my soul(Like a fair face when spotted with a mole),If none with avarice justly brand my fame,With sordidness, or deeds too vile to name;If pure and innocent, if dear (forgiveThese little praises) to my friends I live,My father was the cause, who, though maintainedBy a lean farm but poorly, yet disdainedThe country schoolmaster, to whose low careThe mighty captain sent his high-born heir,With satchel, copy-book, and pelf to payThe wretched teacher on th' appointed day.To Rome by this bold father was I brought,To learn those arts which well-born youth are taught;So dressed and so attended, you would swearI was some senator's expensive heir;Himself my guardian, of unblemished truth,Among my tutors would attend my youth,And thus preserved my chastity of mind(That prime of virtue in its highest kind)Not only pure from guilt, but even the shameThat might with vile suspicion hurt my fame;Nor feared to be reproached, although my fateShould fix my fortune in some meaner state,From which some trivial perquisites arise,Or make me, like himself, collector of excise.For this my heart, far from complaining, paysA larger debt of gratitude and praise;Nor, while my senses hold, shall I repentOf such a father, nor with pride resent,As many do, th' involuntary disgraceNot to be born of an illustrious race.But not with theirs my sentiments agree,Or language; for if Nature should decreeThat we from any stated point might liveOur former years, and to our choice should giveThe sires to whom we wished to be allied,Let others choose to gratify their pride;While I, contented with my own, resignThe titled honors of an ancient line.

Horace proceeds to draw a strong contrast between the very onerous duties and social obligations which fall to the lot of the high-born, and his own simple, quiet, independent life.

This friendship with Mæcenas, of which the preceding satire relates the foundation, began in the year 38 B. C., when Horace was twenty-seven years of age. From this time on the poet received many substantial proofs of his patron's regard for him, the most notable of which was the gift of a farm among the Sabine hills about thirty miles from Rome.

Such a gift meant to Horace freedom from the drudgery of the workaday world, consequent leisure for the development of his literary powers, a proper setting and atmosphere for the rustic moods of his muse; while his intimacy in the palace of Mæcenas on the Esquiline gave him standing in the city and ample opportunity for indulging his urban tastes.

Although this gift of the farm and other favors derived from the friendship of Mæcenas were so important to Horace as to color all his after life and work, he nowhere manifests the slightest spirit of sycophancy toward his patron. While always grateful, he makes it very clear that the favors of Mæcenas cannot be accepted at the price of his own personal independence. Rather than lose this, he would willingly resign all that he has received.

The following satire expresses that deep content which the poet experiences upon his farm, the simple delights which he enjoys there, and, by contrast, some of the amusing as well as annoying incidents of his life in Rome as the favorite of the great minister Mæcenas. The satire is in the translation of Sir Theodore Martin.

My prayers with this I used to charge,—A piece of land not over large,Wherein there should a garden be,A clear spring flowing ceaselessly,And where, to crown the whole, there shouldA patch be found of growing wood.All this and more the gods have sent,And I am heartily content.O son of Maia,[B]that I mayThese bounties keep is all I pray.If ne'er by craft or base designI've swelled what little store is mine,Nor mean it ever shall be wreckedBy profligacy or neglect;If never from my lips a wordShall drop of wishes so absurdAs, "Had I but that little nook,Next to my land, that spoils its look!"Or, "Would some lucky chance unfoldA crock to me of hidden gold,As to the man whom HerculesEnriched and settled at his ease,Who, with the treasure he had found,Bought for himself the very groundWhich he before for hire had tilled!"If I with gratitude am filledFor what I have—by this I dareAdjure you to fulfil my prayer,That you with fatness will endowMy little herd of cattle now,And all things else their lord may ownExcept what wits he has, alone,And be, as heretofore, my chiefProtector, guardian, and relief!So, when from town and all its illsI to my perch among the hillsRetreat, what better theme to chooseThan Satire for my homely muse?No fell ambition wastes me there,No, nor the south wind's leaden air,Nor Autumn's pestilential breath,With victims feeding hungry death.

[B]Mercury, the god of gain, and protector of poets.

The poet proceeds to contrast with his restful country life the vexatious bustle of the city, and the officious attentions which people thrust upon him because of his supposed influence with Mæcenas.

Some chilling news through lane and streetSpreads from the Forum. All I meetAccost me thus—"Dear friend, you're soClose to the gods, that you must know;About the Dacians have you heardAny fresh tidings?" "Not a word.""You're always jesting!" "Now may allThe gods confound me, great and small,If I have heard one word!" "Well, wellBut you at any rate can tellIf Cæsar means the lands which heHas promised to his troops shall beSelected from Italian ground,Or in Trinacria be found?"And when I swear, as well I can,That I know nothing, for a manOf silence rare and most discreetThey cry me up to all the street.Thus do my wasted days slip by,Not without many a wish and sigh:Oh, when shall I the country see,Its woodlands green? Oh, when be free,With books of great old men, and sleep,And hours of dreamy ease, to creepInto oblivion sweet of life,Its agitations and its strife?When on my table shall be seenPythagoras' kinsman bean,And bacon, not too fat, embellishMy dish of greens, and give it relish?Oh happy nights, oh feasts divine,When, with the friends I love, I dineAt mine own hearth-fire, and the meatWe leave gives my bluff hinds a treat!No stupid laws our feasts control,But each guest drains or leaves the bowl,Precisely as he feels inclined.If he be strong, and have a mindFor bumpers, good! If not, he's freeTo sip his liquor leisurely.And then the talk our banquet rouses!Not gossip 'bout our neighbors' houses,But what concerns us nearer, andIs harmful not to understand;Whether by wealth or worth, 'tis plainThat men to happiness attain;By what we're led to choose our friends,—Regard for them, or our own ends;In what does good consist, and whatIs the supremest form of that.

At some such informal gathering of neighbors as this the story of the city mouse and the country mouse would be told. The poet's own moral of this homely tale is gathered from the farewell words of the country mouse as he escapes from the splendors—and terrors of the city:

"Ho!" cries the country mouse. "This kindOf life is not for me, I find.Give me my woods and cavern. ThereAt least I'm safe! And though both spareAnd poor my food may be, rebelI never will; so, fare ye well!"

The mantle of the satirist preacher which had fallen from Horace found no worthy claimant for nearly half a century. The successor, and, so far as in him lay, the sincere imitator of Horace, was Aulus Persius Flaccus. His circumstances were as unlike those of his great predecessor as can well be imagined. Horace was the son of a freedman, with no financial or social backing save that which he won by his own genius; Persius was, like Lucilius, of noble equestrian rank, rich, and related by birth to some of the first men of his time. Horace, while he had every opportunity for learning all that books and the schools could teach him, was, as we have already seen, preëminently a student of real life, having been taught by his father to study men as they actually were. Persius, on the other hand, saw little of the world except through the medium of books and teachers. When the future satirist was but six years of age, his father died, and he was brought up chiefly in the society of his mother and sister, carefully shielded from contact with the rough and wicked world. At the age of twelve he was taken from his native Volaterræ in Etruria to Rome, where his formal education was continued in the same careful seclusion until he assumed the toga of manhood. His writings do not, therefore, smack of the street and the world of men as do those of Horace, but they savor of the cloister and the library. Horace preached against the sins of men as he saw them; Persius, as he imagined them and read of them, taking his texts often from the more virile satires of Horace himself. Horace was devoted to no school of philosophy, but accepted what seemed to him best and sanest from all schools, and jeered alike at the follies of all. But Persius was by birth, education, and choice a Stoic. He became an ardent preacher and expounder of the Stoic philosophy, just as Lucretius had thrown his whole heart into expounding the doctrine of Epicurus a hundred years before.

Stoicism, as Tyrrell says, was the "philosophy in which under the Roman Empire the human conscience sought and found an asylum. It had ceased now to be a philosophy, and had become a religion, appealing to the rich and great as Christianity appealed to the poor and humble."

Persius, accordingly, following his early bent, as soon as he arrived at man's estate, placed himself under the care and instruction of Cornutus, a Stoic philosopher. His own account of this event forms one of the most pleasing passages in his works, and is found in the fifth satire, which is a confession of his own ardent devotion both to his friend the Stoic, and to Stoicism as well.

The lofty and almost Christian tone of this ardent young Stoic preacher was greatly admired in the Middle Ages, and he was much quoted by the Church Fathers. His high moral truths sounded out in an age of moral laxity, when faith in the old religious beliefs had given way, and had not yet laid hold upon the nascent doctrine of Christianity which was even now marching westward and was soon to gain admission to Rome itself. To the Stoic, virtue was the bright goal of all living. To gain her was to gain life indeed; and to lose her was to suffer loss irreparable. This loss the poet invokes in a masterly apostrophe in the third satire upon those rulers who basely abuse their power.

Dread sire of gods! when lust's envenomed stingsStir the fierce nature of tyrannic kings;When storms of rage within their bosoms roll,And call in thunder for thy just control;O then relax the bolt, suspend the blow,And thus and thus alone thy vengeance show:In all her charms set Virtue in their eye,And let them see their loss, despair, and die!Gifford.

The Christian tone of Persius is perhaps best seen in the second satire, which is a sermon on prayer. The tone throughout is far above the level of the thinking of his time, and shows a lofty conception of the deity and of spiritual things. In the closing lines especially, he reaches so high and true a spiritual note that he seems almost to have caught a glimpse of those high conceptions which inspired his great contemporary, the apostle Paul. This sermon might well have had for its text the inspired words of the Old Testament prophet Hosea: "For I desired mercy and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings."

That the Romans were not without their own light as to the acceptable offering to heaven is further seen in an ode of Horace, in which he voices the same high truth, that the thought of the heart is of more moment in the sight of God than the offering of the hand. This fine ode ends with the following stanza:

If thy hand, free from ill, the altar touch,Thou shalt the offended gods appease as muchWith gifts of sparkling salt and pious mealAs if thy vows more costly victims seal.Hawkins.

But let us now return to our poet's sermon on prayer. Persius addresses it to his friend Plotius Macrinus, congratulating him upon the returning anniversary of his birthday.

Health to my friend! and while my vows I pay,O mark, Macrinus, this auspicious day,Which, to your sum of years already flown,Adds yet another—with a whiter stone.

Amid the prayers to his tutelary genius this day, Macrinus will not offer those selfish and impious prayers with which men are too prone to come before the gods, prayers which they would not dare to utter to a man, or even in the hearing of men.

Indulge your genius, drench in wine your cares:It is not yours, with mercenary prayers,To ask of heaven what you would die with shame,Unless you drew the gods aside, to name;While other great ones stand, with downcast eyes,And with a silent censer tempt the skies!—Sound sense, integrity, a conscience clear,Are begged aloud, that all at hand may hear;But prayers like these (half whispered, half suppressed)The tongue scarce hazards from the conscious breast:"O that I could my rich old uncle seeIn funeral pomp!—O that some deityTo pots of buried gold would guide my share!O that my ward, whom I succeed as heir,Were once at rest! Poor child, he lives in pain,And death to him must be accounted gain.—By wedlock thrice has Nerius swelled his store,And now—he is a widower once more!"

The ingenious manner in which this prayer is framed so as to calm the conscience of the votary is admirably pointed out by Gifford. "The supplicant meditates no injury to any one. The death of his uncle is concealed under a wish that he could see his magnificent funeral, which, as the poor man must one day die, is a prayer becoming a pious nephew. The second petition is quite innocent.—If people will foolishly bury their gold and forget it, there is no more harm in his finding it than another. The third is even laudable; it is a prayer uttered in pure tenderness of heart, for the relief of a poor suffering child. With respect to the last, there can be no wrong in mentioning a fact which everybody knows. Not a syllable is said of his own wife; if the gods are pleased to take a hint and remove her, that is their concern; he never asked it."

One question, friend, an easy one, in fine:What are thy thoughts of Jove? "My thoughts?" Yes, thine.Wouldst thou prefer him to the herd of Rome?To any individual?—But to whom?To Statius, for example. Heavens! a pause?Which of the two would best dispense of laws?Best shield th' unfriended orphan? Good! Now moveThe suit to Statius, late preferred to Jove:"O Jove! Good Jove!" he cries, o'erwhelmed with shame,And must not Jove himself "O Jove!" exclaim?Or dost thou think the impious wish forgiven,Because, when thunder shakes the vault of heaven,The bolt innoxious flies o'er thee and thine,To rend the forest oak and mountain pine?Because, yet livid from the lightning's scath,Thy smoldering corpse, a monument of wrath,Lies in no blasted grove, for public careTo expiate, with sacrifice and prayer;Must, therefore, Jove, unsceptered and unfearedGive to thy ruder mirth his foolish beard?What bribe hast thou to win the powers divineThus to thy rod?—The lungs and lights of swine!

Again, the ears of heaven are assailed by ignorant and superstitious prayers, against which the poet inveighs. Then follows a rebuke to those who pray for health and happiness, but who, by their vices and folly, thwart their own prayer.

Why do men pray so impiously and foolishly? It is because they entertain such ignorant and unworthy conceptions of the gods, because they think that they are beings of like passions with themselves. No, no! the gods have no such carnal passions, nor do they care for gold and the rich offerings of men's hands. They regard the heart of the worshiper, and if this is pure, even empty hands may bring an acceptable offering.

O grovelling souls, and void of things divine!Why bring our passions to the Immortals' shrine,And judge, from what this carnal sense delights,Of what is pleasing in their purer sights?This the Calabrian fleece with purple soils,And mingles cassia with our native oils;Tears from the rocky conch its pearly store,And strains the metal from the glowing ore.This, this, indeed, is vicious; yet it tendsTo gladden life, perhaps, and boasts its ends;But you, ye priests (for sure ye can), unfold—In heavenly things, what boots this pomp of gold?No more, in truth, than dolls to Venus paid,The toys of childhood, by the riper maid!No! let me bring the Immortals what the raceOf great Messala, now depraved and base,On their huge charger, cannot;—bring a mindWhere legal and where moral sense are joinedWith the pure essence; holy thoughts that dwellIn the soul's most retired and sacred cell;A bosom dyed in honor's noblest grain,Deep-dyed;—with these let me approach the fane,And heaven will hear the humble prayer I make,Though all my offering be a barley cake.Gifford.

When one has read his Horace, one feels personally acquainted with the poet, so frankly biographical is he. This is true, though to a much less extent, of Persius. But Juvenal is almost sphinxlike in regard to himself. What little we know is gained from a few indirect references in his writings themselves, and from the numerous and contradictory ancient lives which have come down to us prefaced to the different manuscripts of Juvenal's satires. From these we gather that he was born sometime between 48 and 55 A. D., at the town of Aquinum in Latium, and was the son of a well-to-do freedman who left him a patrimony sufficient for his modest maintenance through life. He had a good education in grammar and rhetoric, and devoted himself through a large part of his earlier life to rhetorical declamation; though he seems not to have made any professional or profitable use of the talent which he undoubtedly possessed for the vocation of the advocate. He enjoyed some unimportant though honorable civil employment under Titus and Domitian, and served for one period of his life in the army, probably in Britain, with the rank of military tribune.

In Juvenal's later life he seems to have given offense either to Domitian by some lines which he wrote upon a favorite pantomime dancer of the emperor, or to Hadrian for a similar cause. By one or the other of these emperors, according to tradition, he was practically exiled by an appointment to a command of a legion in Africa. The date of his death is as uncertain as that of his birth, but it seems to lie between 128 and 138 A. D.

It will be seen, therefore, that our poet was contemporaneous with ten Roman emperors, his life covering the period from Nero to Hadrian, inclusive. It was during the reign of Domitian, however, that Juvenal, now already well advanced to middle life, took up his residence in Rome and began that work which was to be his material contribution to life and letters.

Life in Rome under Domitian!—what a challenge to the satirist! what a field for the preacher! These were the crowning years of well-nigh a century of ever-increasing horror. With the downfall of liberty and the republic, both of which had perished in fact long before their name and semblance vanished, wealth and luxury had poured into Rome from the conquered provinces, and with these that moral laxity against which Horace had aimed his satire, then in four successive reigns Rome had cringed and groaned under the absolute sway of cynic, madman, fool, and flippant murderer, each more recklessly disregardful than the last of civic virtue and the lives and common rights of man. Then three puppets within a year involving the world in civil strife were themselves swept off the stage by Vespasian and Titus, who did indeed give passing respite to the state. And then for fifteen years—Domitian! Of these fifteen years Tacitus, just emerging into the grateful light of Nerva's and of Trajan's reigns, indignantly exclaims:

They had besides expelled all the professors of philosophy, and driven every laudable science into exile, that naught which was worthy and honest might anywhere be seen. Mighty, surely, was the testimony which we gave of our patience; and as our forefathers had beheld the ultimate consummation of liberty, so did we of bondage, since through dread of informers and inquisitions of state, we were bereft of the common intercourse of speech and attention. Nay, with our utterance we had likewise lost our memory, had it been equally in our power to forget as to be silent.... Few we are who have escaped; and, if I may so speak, we have survived not only others, but even ourselves, when from the middle of our lives so many years were rent; whence from being young we are arrived at old age, from being old we are nigh come to the utmost verge of mortality, all in a long course of awful silence.—Galton.

Somewhat earlier than this, though within the same generation, Paul the apostle to the Gentiles,thepreacher of that dark age, had written a letter to the infant Christian church at Rome in which he had drawn a terrible picture of what human society can become when it has thrown off all checks and abandoned itself to profligacy. His picture, we may be sure, was drawn from the life.

And even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up unto a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural affection, unmerciful: who, knowing the ordinance of God, that they which practice such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but also consent with them that practice them.

Upon such a world as this did Juvenal, in the prime of manhood, his powers of reason, observation, and expression fully ripened, look out from his home in the Roman Subura;[C]with the product of such times did he mingle in the crowded reception-rooms of rich and noble patrons. He looked upon society and noted it, and long restrained his speech. But at last, as Tyrrell has well expressed it, "the flood of indignation, pent up in furious silence for forty years, once loose, carried away on its current or tossed aside every obstacle that impeded its onward rush."

[C]A quarter in Rome given up to markets and tenement-houses.

And this is that which mainly distinguishes him from Horace—his tremendous moral earnestness, his fiery indignation. His spirit did not allow him to play with his theme; there were hard blows to strike at outbreaking sins, and he would strike them. And if venial faults were struck as hard as more serious offenses, that was a proof not of inconsistency, but of an earnestness that could not stop to distinguish; if he writes of practices too shameful for telling in the hearing of polite ears, it is because his righteous indignation was in no mood to mince words, but would hold up vice in all its hideousness to the fatal light. He speaks with frankness of shameful sins, but only to hurl his denunciations at them. He is always in a rage,—strenuous where Horace is gently satirical and whimsical; didactic and straightforward where Horace is conversational and dramatic. At the same time he paints most vivid pictures, filling in the lines with tremendous sweeps of his rhetorical brush.

He tells us that he was fairly driven to write satire by the very atmosphere and daily occurrences of folly and sin around him.[D]

[D]The quotations from Juvenal which follow are taken from the excellent prose version of Leeper.

For who so tolerant of this wrong-headed city, who so callous, that he can contain himself when lawyer Matho's brand-new litter comes along, filled with his Greatness, and after him the betrayer of his distinguished friend, who will soon finish off the remnants of our nobility already preyed upon.... Is not one moved to fill a bulky note-book right in the middle of the cross-roads, when a man is carried past, already indulging in six bearers, showing himself to view on both sides—a forger who has made himself aristocrat and millionaire with a little tablet and a damp seal? Now you are confronted by a lady of position, who, when her husband is thirsty, just before she hands him the mild Calenian, puts in a dash of poison, and, like a superior Lucusta, teaches her unsophisticated kinswomen to carry their livid husbands to burial right through the town and all its gossip.... It is to crime that men owe their pleasure-grounds, their castles, banquets, old silver, and goblets with goat's figure in relief.... When nature refuses, sheer scorn produces verse—the best it can.

He cannot abide the Greeks. His national pride is touched at the thought that not only do they swarm in Rome, monopolizing by their superior shrewdness all profitable employments, but that Rome itself has gone crazy after them, and things Greek are all the rage.

And now I will at once admit to you,—no false shame shall stop me,—what class is most in favor with our wealthy men, and whom most of all I am flying from. I cannot abide, fellow-citizen, a Greecized Rome.... Your yeoman citizen, Quirinus, dons his Greek boots and wears a Greek collar upon a neck rubbed with Greek ointment.... What a quick intellect, what desperate effrontery, what a ready tongue, surpassing Isæus himself in fluency. Tell me now, what do you take him for? In his own person he has brought us—why, whom you will—critic, rhetorician, geometer, painter, trainer, prophet, rope-dancer, doctor, sorcerer. The starveling Greek knows everything.... Mark how that race, so adroit in flattery, extols the foolish friend's conversation, the ill-favored friend's features; how they compare some weakling's scraggy neck with the throat of a Hercules, or admire a harsh voice which is not a whit better than the cry of a cock.... The whole breed of them are actors. If you but smile, your Greek shakes his sides with heartier merriment; he weeps, if he has spied a tear in his friend's eye, and yet he feels no grief. If you ask in winter time for a bit of a fire, he takes an overcoat: should you remark, "I feel warm," he is in a sweat.

Juvenal complains bitterly of the unproductiveness of honest toil in literature and the professions. It's all very well to talk about the poet's inspiration, but Pegasus does not fly upon an empty stomach.

He has dined, has Horace, when he shouts his "Evoe." ... Were Vergil left without a slave and a decent lodging, then every snake would tumble from his locks: his trumpet would be hushed, and sound forth no more impressive notes.... Historians, is your toil more productive? It demands more time and more oil. Each of you, doubtless, has his pages rising by the hundred, knowing no limit, growing towards bankruptcy with the pile of papyrus. But what is your harvest—what does opening up that field yield you? Who will pay a historian as much as he would pay a reporter?... Then say what public services and the ever-present big packet of documents bring in to our advocates. Would you know their real gains? In one scale set a hundred advocates' estates; in the other just that of Lacerna, the Red Jockey.

The teacher fares no better:

Who places in Celadus' and learned Palæmon's lap a due reward for their scholastic toils? Yet, little as it is, the pupil's stupid body servant takes the first bite, and the steward will snip off a something for himself. Submit to it, Palæmon; let something be abated of your due, as if you were a-huckstering winter blankets and white counterpanes.

Here is his exhortation to those degenerate Roman nobles who prided themselves upon their blue blood and ancient names, but whose lives belied their birth. The sentiment may seem a commonplace, but it still inspires our modern poets, as in Tennyson:

'Tis only noble to be good.Kind hearts are more than coronets,And simple faith than Norman blood.

Of what avail are pedigrees? What boots it, Ponticus, taking rank by length of descent, and having one's ancestors' portrait-masks to show off? What do you gain by the display of a Corvinus in your big family roll, or by your affinity with smoke-begrimed Masters of the Horse, if you live a life of shame in the very face of the Lepidi?... No, though time-honored waxen likenesses adorn the length and breadth of your hall, still virtue is the sole and only nobility. Be a Paulus, a Cossus, or a Drusus incharacter. Rank that above the statues of your ancestors. The first thing you are bound to show me is a good heart. If by word and deed you deserve the character of a blameless man, one who cleaves to the right—good: I recognize the noble; I salute you, Gætulicus be you, or Silanus, or of whatever other blood you come.... For who will call "noble" one who shames his race, and challenges notice by the luster of his name alone?

The very horse is ranked and valued by what he does; so much more man, and besides,noblesse oblige:

He is a "noble" steed, whatever grass he comes from, who takes rank above his fellows—in pace, and who raises the dust upon the course ahead of all; but the progeny of Coryphæus and Hirpinus are "stock for sale"—if Victory has rarely perched on their collar.Thereis no regard for ancestors, no favoritism toward the shades of the departed.... Therefore, so that we may admire yourself and not your belongings, give me something of your own to carve 'neath your statue, beyond the honors which we have rendered, and render still, to those who made you all you are.

Juvenal's most famous satire is the tenth, upon the theme "The Vanity of Human Wishes." It is more general in scope than the other satires, but is nevertheless full of the moral earnestness that everywhere characterizes the author. Here is the broad thesis:

Through all lands but few are they who can clear themselves of the mists of errors, and discriminate between the real blessings and what are quite the reverse. For in what fear or wish of ours are we guided by reason's rule? No matter how auspiciously you start with a plan, do you not live to regret your efforts and the attainment of your desire? Whole households have been overthrown ere now, at their own petition, by a too gracious heaven. By the arts of peace and war alike we strive for what will only hurt us.

Wealth is notoriously a fatal gift, and should be shunned, not sought. No one need fear poison if he drinks his wine out of a cheap cup. If the love of money is the root of all evil, the possession of money is a challenge to all evil-doers. What, then, may one rightly desire? Power? This is just as fatal to its possessor.

Some are brought to ruin through their great power, subject itself to envy just as great; they are wrecked by their long and brilliant roll of honors; down from the pedestals come their statues, and now the stroke of the axe shatters the very wheels of the triumphal cars. Hark! now the fires are hissing, now, by dint of bellows and forge, that head, the people's idol, is aglow; and the great Sejanus is a crackling! And soon from the face, second to one only in the whole world, they are making pipkins, and basins, and a pan—ay, and even meaner vessels!... What laid low a Crassus, and a Pompey, and that leader who broke the proud Romans' spirit and brought them under his lash? Why, it was just the unscrupulous struggling for the highest place, and the prayer of ambition, heard but too well by the malicious gods. It is but seldom that a king does not take a murderous crowd with him down to Ceres' son-in-law; seldom that a despot dies without blood-letting.... Just weigh Hannibal. How many pounds' weight will you find in that greatest of leaders? This is the man for whom Africa is too small—Africa, lashed by the Moorish main, and stretching thence to the tepid Nile; and, on another side again, to the Ethiopian tribes with their towering elephants! He adds Spain to his empire; he bounds over the Pyrenees; Nature barred his path with her Alp and her snow; he rives the rocks and bursts the mountain with vinegar. Now he holds Italy, yet he still strains forward. "Nothing," cries he, "is gained unless we storm the city gates with our Punic soldiery, and this hand plants my standard in the very heart of Rome!" Oh, what a sight! oh, what a subject for a caricature—the one-eyed general bestriding the Gætulian monster! What, then, is his end? Fie, glory! Why, he in his turn is conquered, and flies headlong into exile; and there he sits, that august dependent—a gazing stock at a king's gates—until it may please His Majesty of Bithynia to awake. The soul which once turned the world upside down shall be quelled, not by a sword, not by a stone, no, nor by a javelin; but by that Nemesis of Cannæ, the avenger of all that blood—just a ring.[E]Off with you, madman! Scour the bleak Alps, that so you may—catch the fancy of schoolboys, and become a theme for declamation!

[E]Hannibal always carried with him, concealed in a ring, a dose of poison, with which, at last, he took his own life, to escape capture by the Romans.

If any are disposed to pray for long life and length of days, Juvenal's dark and repulsive picture of old age would effectually banish that desire. One by one the physical and mental powers fail and the man is left but a pitiful wreck of his former self.

But suppose his faculties be sound, yet still he must conduct his sons to their burial; must gaze at the pyre of his beloved wife, and of his brother, and on urns filled with what was once his sisters. This is the forfeit laid upon longevity, to pass to old age amid bereavement after bereavement, thick-coming griefs, and one weary round of lamentations, with the garb of the mourner never laid aside.

But age brings not alone loss of friends, but in many instances personal suffering and disaster from which one would be mercifully delivered by a more timely death. This, Caius Marius, the great Roman general, found to his cost:

That banishment, that jail, Minturnæ's swamps, and the bread of beggary in conquered Carthage, all had their origin in a long life. What happier being in the world than that Roman could nature, could Rome ever have produced, if, after leading round the train of captives amid all the circumstance of war, he had breathed out his soul in glory, when just stepping down from his Teutonic car?

As for beauty, foolish indeed is that mother who prays for her son or her daughter that he or she may possess this; for it is the most fatal possession of all. Not even the most rugged training of the old Sabine school of morality can shield the possessor of great beauty from the poisonous, insidious temptations, if not actual violence, of the wicked world. What then?

Shall men then pray for nothing? If you will take my advice, you will allow the gods themselves to determine what is meet for us, and suited to our lot; for the gods will give us—not what is pleasant, but what is most befitting in each case. Man is dearer to them than to himself. Urged on by impulse, by blind and violent desires, we pray for a wife, and for offspring; but only they (the gods) know what the children will be, and of what character the wife. Still, if you must make your petition, and must vow a meat offering at the shrine, then pray for a healthy mind in a healthy body; pray for a brave spirit free from the fear of death—a spirit that regards life's close as one of nature's boons, that can endure any toil, that is innocent of anger and free from desire, and that looks on the sufferings of Hercules and his cruel labors as more blessed than all the wantoning, and reveling, and down-couches of a Sardanapalus.

Perhaps the appeal of Juvenal that comes most powerfully to the present generation, and contains the most solemn lesson for us, is his warning to fathers and mothers that all unconsciously to them their sons and daughters are following in their footsteps, bound to copy them, and reproduce their faults in later life. The presence of a child is as sacred as a temple shrine, and should be as carefully guarded from every profaning influence. It is surely notable to find this wholesome teaching springing like a lily out of the mire of that degenerate age. It smacks neither of fervid rhetoric nor of cold and formal philosophy, but rings true and natural as childhood itself.

Let no foul word or sight come nigh the threshold where dwells the father of a family.You owe your boy the profoundest respect. If meditating aught that is base, despise not your boy's tender years; but let the image of your infant son arrest you on the verge of sin.For should he some day do a deed to earn the censor's wrath, and show himself not only your counterpart in face and figure, but heir of your character as well—one to follow in your steps, and sin every sin in worse degree—you will chide and scold him, no doubt, with loud reproaches, and then proceed to change your will. But whence that boldness, whence those parental rights, when you do worse, despite your age? If company is coming, none of your people will have any rest. Sweep the pavement! Let me see the pillars glistening! Down with the shriveled spider and all her web! Ho! you polish the plain silver, and you the figured cups! So the master storms at the top of his voice, urging them on, with rod in hand. Poor wretch! are you in such a fidget lest the hall may offend your friend's eye, when he comes, and lest the vestibule be splashed with mud—all of which one little page with one half-peck of sawdust puts to rights—but yet bestow no thought on this, that your son's eye shall rest upon a household unsullied, stainless, innocent of vice? We thank you that you gave a citizen to your country and your people, if you make him worthy of that country, helpful to its soil, helpful in public work, in peace and war; for it will matter much in what lessons and principles you train him.

Such wholesome truths as these and many more did Juvenal press home upon his generation. And he speaks no less to all humanity; for the problems of human life and conduct are not peculiar to any age, but are always and everywhere the same.

We have now reviewed two centuries of Roman preachers, and it may naturally be asked, "What was their influence upon the Roman world?" No direct results are traceable to their efforts. Society went on its accustomed course; the seeds of decay and death sprang up, grew to maturity, and brought forth their natural fruits of national destruction in due season, apparently unchecked by the counter influences of which we have spoken. These influences cannot yet be weighed and known—not until account has been taken of all the factors in the world's life problem, the grand totals cast up and the trial balance made. But in that time the bead-roll of the world's real benefactors will contain the names of these Roman satirists whose voices were raised against an age of wrong in immemorial protest, who were the numb and dormant conscience of the human race awakened and incarnate in a human tongue.

Roman Satire, as illustrated by the works of Ennius (239-169 B. C.), Lucilius (180-103 B. C.), Horace (65-8 B. C.), Persius (34-62 A. D.), and Juvenal (48(?)-138(?) A. D.).

1. What position did the Roman satirist occupy as a teacher of morals? 2. Show how the great Greek writers served as models for the leading Roman men of letters. 3. In what literary field did the Romans strike out for themselves? 4. What may we suppose was the character of the rude satire of ancient Italy? 5. What position does Ennius hold among Roman satirists? 6. What famous events took place within the lifetime of Lucilius? 7. How did his social position help to make his writings effective? 8. What did the Romans themselves think of him? 9. How have fragments of his works been preserved to us? 10. What picture of life in the Roman Forum does he present? 11. Give other examples of the teachings of Lucilius. 12. Quote his definition of virtue. 13. How does Horace's attitude toward his fellow-men differ from that of Lucilius? 14. What advantage had he in his early education? 15. Illustrate his habit of personal reflection upon the events of the day. 16. What are the marked qualities of his style? 17. Describe his argument in favor of contentment. 18. What qualities of the "bore" are brought out in his famous satire on this subject? 19. What is his criticism of Lucilius? 20. Give an account of Horace's own life. 21. What ideas does he set forth in his satire to Mæcenas? 22. What description does he give of his father? 23. What picture does he give of his life on his farm as contrasted with his life in Rome? 24. How did the circumstances of the life of Persius differ from those of Horace? 25. How different is his poetry for this reason? 26. Illustrate the poet's high estimate of Stoicism. 27. How does he treat the subject of prayer in one of his famous satires? 28. How is his skill shown in his picture of the false suppliant? 29. What do we know of the life of Juvenal? 30. What was the character of the times in which he lived? 31. How does his style differ from that of Horace? 32. How does he deal with the Hellenizing tendencies of his time? 33. Give an outline of his satire upon the vanity of human wishes. 34. What is his solemn warning to parents?

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