CONCLUSION.

Ille per extentum funem mihi posse videturIrePOETA:

it being more especially this property, which, of itself, discovers thetrue dramatist, and secures the success of his performance, not only without the assistance ofart, but in direct opposition to its clearest dictates.

This power has been felt on a thousand other occasions. But its triumphs were never more conspicuous, than in the famous instance of theCidof P. Corneille; which, by the sole means of this enchanting quality, drew along with it the affections and applauses of a whole people: notwithstanding the manifest transgression of some essential rules, the utmost tyranny of jealous power, and, what is more, in defiance of all the authority and good sense of one of the justest pieces of criticism in the French language, written purposely to discredit and expose it.

224.Cum lamentamur non adparere labores Nostros, &c.] It was remarked upon verse 211, that the beauties of a poem can onlyappearby being felt. Andthey, to whom they do not appear in this instance, are the writer’s ownfriends, who, it is not to be supposed, would disguise theirfeelings. So that thelamentation, here spoken of, is at once a proof ofimpertinencein the poet, andof thebadnessof his poetry, which sets the complainant in a very ridiculous light.

228.Egere vetes.] The poet intended, in these words, a very just satire on those presumingwits and scholars, who, under the pretence of getting above distressfulwant, in reality aspire to public honours and preferments; though this be the most inexcusable of all follies (to give it the softest name), which can infest a man of letters: Both, because experience, on which a wise man would chuse to regulate himself, is contrary to these hopes; and, because if literary merit could succeed in them, theReward, as the poet speaks,

would either bringNo joy, or be destructive of the thing:

That is, the learned would either have no relish for the delights of so widely different a situation; or, which hath oftener been the case, would lose the learning itself, or theloveof it at least, on which their pretensions to thisrewardare founded.

232.Gratus Alexandro regi magno&c.] This praise of Augustus, arising from the comparison of his character with that of Alexander, is extremely fine. It had been observed of the Macedonian by his historians and panegyrists, that, to the stern virtues of theconqueror, he had joined the softer accomplishments of thevirtuoso, in a just discernment and love ofpoetry, and of theelegant arts.The one was thought clear from his admiration and study of Homer: And theother, from his famous edict concerning Apelles and Lysippus, could not be denied. Horace finds means to turn both these circumstances in his story to the advantage of his prince.

From his extravagant pay of such a wretched versifier, asChoerilus, he would insinuate, that Alexander’s love of the muse was, in fact, but a blind unintelligent impulse towardsglory. And from his greater skill in the arts ofsculptureandpainting, than ofverse, he represents him as more concerned about thedrawingof his figure, than the pourtraiture of hismannersandmind. Whereas Augustus, by his liberalities toVariusandVirgil, had discovered the truest taste in theart, from which he expected immortality: and, in trusting tothat, as thechiefinstrument of his fame, had confessed a prior regard to thosemental virtues, which are the real ornament of humanity, before thatlook of terror, andair and attitude of victory, in which the brute violence of Alexander most delighted to be shewn.

243.Musarum dona] The expression is happy; as implying, that theseimagesof virtue, which are represented as of such importance to the glory of princes, are not the mereofferingsof poetry to greatness, but thefree-giftsof the muse to the poet. For it is only to suchworks, as these, thatHorace attributes the wondrous efficacy of expressing themanners and mindin fuller and more durable relief, thansculpturegives to theexterior figure.

Non magis expressi vultus per aënea signa,Quam per vatis opus mores animique virorumClarorum adparent.

247.—Virgilius.] Virgil is mentioned, in this place, simply as aPoet. The precise idea of hispoetryis given us elsewhere.

molle atque facetumVirgilio annuerunt gaudentes rure Camoenae.1 Sat. x. 44.

But this may appear a strange praise of the sweet and polished Virgil. It appeared so to Quinctilian, who cites this passage, and explains it, without doubt, very justly, yet in such a way as shews that he was not quite certain of the truth of his explanation.

The case, I believe, was this. The wordfacetum, which makes the difficulty, had acquired, in Quinctilian’s days, the sense ofpleasant,witty, orfacetious,in exclusionto every other idea, which had formerly belonged to it. It is true that, in the Augustan age, and still earlier,facetumwas sometimes used in this sense. But its proper and original meaning was no more thanexact,factitatum, benè factum. And in this strict sense, I believe, it is always used by Horace.

Malthinus tunicis demissis ambulat: est quiInguen ad obscoenum subductis usque facetus.1 S. ii. 25.

i. e.tucked up, trim, expedite.

Mutatis tantùm pedibus numerisque facetus.1 S. iv. 7.

i. e. he [Lucilius] adopted astrictermeasure, than the writers of the old comedy; or, by changing the loose iambic to the Hexameter verse, he gave a proof of hisart,skill, andimproved judgment.

frater, pater, adde;Ut cuique est aetas, ita quemque facetus adopta.1. Ep. vi. 55.

i. e.nicelyandaccuratelyadapt your address to the age and condition of each.

I do not recollect any other place wherefacetusis used by Horace; and in all these it seems probable to me that the principal idea, conveyed by it, is that ofcare,art,skill, only differently modified according to the subject to which it is applied: a gown tucked upwith care—a measurestudiouslyaffected—an addressnicelyaccommodated—No thought ofridiculeorpleasantryintended.

It is the same in the present instance—

MOLLE ATQUE FACETUM

i. e.a soft flowing versification, andan exquisitely finished expression: the two precise, characteristic merits of Virgil’sruralpoetry.

This change, in the sense of words, is common in all languages, and creeps in so gradually and imperceptiblyas to elude the notice, sometimes, of the best critics, even in their own language. The transition of ideas, in the present instance, may be traced thus. As what waswittilysaid, was moststudied,artificial, andexquisite, hence in process of timefacetumlost its primary sense, and came to signify merely,witty.

We have a like example in our own language. Agood witmeant formerly a man of good natural sense and understanding: but because what we now callwitwas observed to be the flower and quintessence, as it were, of good sense, hencea man of witis now the exclusive attribute of one who exerts his good sense in that peculiar manner.

247.Dilecti tibi Virgilius&c.] It does honour to the memory of Augustus, that he bore theaffection, here spoken of, to this amiable poet; who was not more distinguished from his contemporary writers by the force of an original, inventive genius, than the singular benevolence and humanity of his character. Yet there have been critics of so perverse a turn, as to discover an inclination, at least, of disputing both.

1. Some have taken offence at his supposed unfriendly neglect of Horace, who, on every occasion, shewed himself so ready to lavish all his praises on him. But the folly of this slander is of a piece with its malignity, as proceeding on the absurd fancy, that Virgil’s friends might as easily have slidinto such works, as the Georgics and Eneïs, as those of Horace into the various occasional poems, which employed his pen.

Just such another senseless suspicion hath been raised of his jealousy of Homer’s superior glory (a vice, from which the nature of the great poet was singularly abhorrent), only, because he did not think fit to give him the first place among the poets inElysium, several hundred years before he had so much as made his appearance uponearth.

But these petty calumnies of hismoralcharacter hardly deserve a confutation. What some greater authorities have objected to hispoetical, may be thought more serious. For,

2. It has been given out by some of better note among the moderns, and from thence, according to the customary influence of authority, hath become the prevailing sentiment of the generality of the learned, that the great poet was more indebted for his fame to theexactness of his judgment; to his industry, and a certain trick of imitation, than to the energy of natural genius; which he is thought to have possessed in a very slender degree.

This charge is founded on the similitude, which all acknowledge, betwixt his great work, the Aeneis, and the poems of Homer. But, “how far such similitude infers imitation; or, how far imitation itself infers an inferiority of natural genius in the imitator,” this hath never been considered. In short the affair ofimitationin poetry, though one of themost curious and interesting in all criticism, hath been, hitherto, very little understood: as may appear from hence, that there is not, as far as I can learn, one single treatise, now extant, written purposely to explain it; the discourse, which the learnedMenageintended, and which, doubtless, would have given light to this matter, having never, as I know of, been made public. To supply, in some measure, this loss, I have thought it not amiss to put together and methodize a few reflexions of my own on this subject, which (because the matter is large, and cannot easily be drawn into a compass, that suits with the nature of these occasional remarks) the reader will find in a distinct and separate dissertation upon it53.

And, now, having explained, in the best manner I could, the two famous Epistles of Horace to Augustus and the Pisos, it may be expected, in conclusion, that I should say something of the rest of our poet’s critical writings. For hisSermones(under which general term I include hisEpistles) are of two sorts,MoralandCritical; and, though both are exquisite, thelatterare perhaps, in their kind, the more perfect of the two; hismoralprinciples being sometimes, I believe, liable to exception, hiscritical, never.

The two pieces, illustrated in these volumes, arestrictlycritical: thefirst, being a professed criticism of the Roman drama; and thelast, in order to their vindication, of the Roman poets. The rest of his works, which turn upon this subject of criticism, may be rather termedApologetical. They are theIVthandXthof theFirst, andIstof theSecondbook of Satires; and theXIXthof theFirst, and, in part, theIIdof theSecondbook of Epistles.

Inthese, the poet hasTHREEgreat objects; one or other of which he never loses sight of, and generally he prosecutes them all together, in the same piece. These objects are, 1. to vindicate the way of writing in satire. 2. To justify his opinion of a favourite writer of this class, the celebrated Lucilius. And 3. to expose the careless and incorrect composition of the Roman writers.

He was himself deeply concerned in these three articles; so that he makes his own apology at the same time that he criticizes or censures others. Theaddressof the poet’s manner will be seen by bearing in mind this general purpose of his critical poetry. How he came to beengagedin this controversy, will best appear from a few observations on the state of the Roman learning, when he undertook to contribute his pains to the improvement of it.

I have, in the introduction to the first of these volumes, given a slight sketch of the rise and progress of the Roman satire. This poem, was purely of Roman invention:first of all, struck out of the old fescennine farce, and rudely cultivated, by Ennius:Next, more happily treated, and enriched with the best part of the old comedy, by Lucilius: And, after some succeeding essays, taken up and finally adorned, by Horace.

Horacewas well known to the public by his lyric compositions, and still more perhaps by his favour at court, when he took upon him to correct the manners and taste of his age, by hisLucilian Satires. But, here, he encountered, at once, many prejudices; and all his own credit, together with that of his court-friends, was little enough to support him, against the torrent.

First, the kind of writing itself was sure to give offence. For, though men were well enough pleased to have their natural malignity gratified by an old poet’s satire against aformerage, yet they were naturally alarmed at the exercise of this talent upon theirown, and, as it might chance, upon themselves.

The poet’s eminence, and favour, would, besides, give a peculiar force andeffectto his censures, so that all who found, or thought themselves liable to them, were concerned, in interest, to discredit the attempt, and blast his rising reputation.

Omnes hi metuunt versus, oderePOETAM.

Hence, he was constrained to stand upon his own defence, and to vindicate, as well the thing itself, as his management of it, to the tender and suspicious public.

But this was not all: For,Secondly, an old satirist, of high birth and quality,Lucilius, was considered, not only as an able writer of this class,but as a perfect model in it; and of course, therefore, this new satirist would be much decried and undervalued, on the comparison. This circumstance obliged the poet to reduce this admired writer to his real value; which could not be done without thwarting the general admiration, and pointing out his vices and defects in the freest manner. This perilous task he discharged in theIVthsatire of his first book, and with such rigour of criticism, that not only the partizans of Lucilius, in the poet’s own age, but the most knowing and candid critics of succeeding times, were disposed to complain of it. However, the obnoxious step had been taken; and nothing remained but to justify himself, as he hath done at large, in hisXthsatire.

On the whole, in comparing what he has said in these two satires with what Quinctilian long after observed on the subject of them, there seems no reason to conclude, that the poet judged ill; though he expressed his judgment in such terms as he would, no doubt, have something softened (out of complaisance to the general sentiment, and a becoming deference to the real merits of his master), if his adversaries had been more moderate in urging their charge, or if the occasion had not been so pressing.

Lastly, this attack on Lucilius produced, or rather involved in it, aTHIRDquarrel. The poet’s main objection to Lucilius was his careless, verbose, and hasty composition, which his admirers, no doubt, called genius, grace, and strength. Thisbeing an inveterate folly among his countrymen, he gives it no quarter. Through all his critical works, he employs the utmost force of his wit and good sense to expose it: And his own writings, being at the same time supremely correct, afforded his enemies (which would provoke them still more) no advantage against him. Yet they attempted, as they could, to repay his perpetual reproaches on the popular writers for their neglect oflimae labor, by objecting to him, in their turn, that what he wrote wassine nervis: and this, though they felt hisforcethemselves, and though another set of men were complaining, at the same time, of his severity.

Sunt quibus in satyrâ videor nimisACER—SINE NERVISaltera quicquidComposui pars esse putat, similesque meorumMille die versusdeduci posse—

His detractors satirically alluding, in these last words, to his charge against Lucilius—

in horâsaepèducentos,Ut magnum, versusdictabat, stans pede in uno.

It is not my purpose, in this place, to enlarge further on the character of Lucilius, whosewordysatires gave occasion to our poet’s criticism. Several of the ancient writers speak of him occasionally, in terms of the highest applause; and without doubt, he was a poet of distinguished merit. Yet it will hardly be thought, at this day, that it could be any discredit to him to be censured, rivalled, and excelled by Horace.

What I have here put together is only to furnish the young reader with the properKeyto Horace’s critical works, which generally turn on his own vindication,against the enemies of satire—the admirers of Lucilius—and the patrons of loose and incorrect composition.

In managing these several topics, he has found means to introduce a great deal of exquisite criticism. And though his scattered observations go but a little way towards making up a complete critical system, yet they are soluminous, as the French speak, that is, they are so replete with good sense, and extend so much further than to the case to which they are immediately applied, that they furnish many of the principles on which such a system, if ever it be taken in hand, must be constructed: And, without carrying matters too far, we may safely affirm of theseCritical Discourses, that, next to Aristotle’s immortal work, they are the most valuable remains of ancient art upon this subject.

J. Nichols and Son, Printers,Red Lion Passage, Fleet Street, London.

FOOTNOTES:1[A Cross with the initials on a label—I. N. R. I. a Glory above, and the motto below ΕΚ ΠΙΣΤΕΩΣ.]2“We, the Bishop and Dean and Chapter and Clergy of the Church and Diocese of Worcester, humbly beg leave to present our dutiful respects to your Majesty, and to express the joy we feel on your Majesty’s arrival at this place.“Your presence, Sir, gladdens the hearts of your faithful subjects, wherever you go. But We, the Clergy of this place, have a peculiar cause to rejoice in the honour vouchsafed us at this time; a time, devoted to an excellent charity for the relief of a most deserving, though unfortunate part of our Order. This gracious notice and countenance of us at such a moment, shews, as your whole life has invariably done, your zealous concern for the interests of Religion, and the credit of its Ministers. And we trust, Sir, that we entertain a due sense of this goodness; and that we shall never be wanting in the most dutiful attachment to your Majesty’s sacred person, to your august house, and to your mild and beneficent government.“In our daily celebration of the sacred offices, committed to our charge, we make it our fervent prayer to Almighty God, that He will be pleased to take your Majesty into his special protection; and that your Majesty may live long, very long, in health and honour, to be the blessing and the delight of all your people.”[The above is the substance, and I believe the words, of my address to the King at Worcester, 6th August 1788.]To this address his Majesty was pleased to return an answer, very gracious, personally, to the Bishop himself, and expressive of the highest regard for the Clergy of the Established Church.R. W.3[Edward Foley, Esq. Member of Parliament for the County, and William Langford, D. D. late Prebendary of Worcester.]4The Reverend Mr.Budworth, Head-Master of the Grammar School atBrewood, in Staffordshire. He died in 1745.5Satyra hæc est in sui sæculi poetas,PRÆCIPUEvero in Romanum drama. Baxter.6Præf. inLIB. POET.et l. vi. p. 338.7Mærorem minui, says Tully, grieving for the loss of his daughter,dolorem nec potui, nec, si possem,VELLEM. [Ep. ad Att. xii. 28.] A striking picture of real grief!8Vel tibi composita canteturEpistolavoce;Ignotum hoc aliis ille novavit opus.Art. Amat.l. iii. v. 345.9J. Scaliger says,Epistolas, Græcorum more, Phocylidæ atque Theognidis[Horatius]scripsit: præceptis philosophiæ divulsis minimeque inter se cohærentibus. And ofthisEpistle, in particular, he presumes to say,De Arte quæres quid sentiam. Quid? Equidem quod de Arte sine arte traditâ.And to the same purpose another great Critic;Non solum antiquorum ὑποθηκαι in moralibus hoc habuere, ut ἀκολουθίαν non servarent, sed etiam alia de quibuscunque rebus præcepta. Sic Epistola Horatii ad Pisones de Poëticâ perpetuum ordinem seriemqueNULLAMhabet; sed ab uno præcepto ad aliud transilit, quamvisNULLAsit materiæ affinitas ad sensum connectendum.[Salmasii Not. in Epictetum et Simplicium, p. 13.Lugd. Bat.1640.]10SeeVictor. Comm. in Dem. Phaler.p. 73.Florent.1594.11The reader may see a fine speech in the Cyropædia of Xenophon [l. iv.] where not so much as this is observed.12SeeRobert Stephens’s Fragm. Vet. Latinorum.13SirPhilip Sidney.14Quel avantage ne peut il [le poëte] pas tirer d’une troupe d’acteurs, qui remplissent sa scene, qui rendent plus sensible la continuité de l’action, et qui la font paroitreVRAISEMBLABLE,puisqu’il n’est pas naturel qu’elle se passe sans temoins. On ne sent que trop le vuide de notre Théatre sans chœurs, &c.[Le Théatre des Grecs, vol. i. p. 105.]15See also to the same purpose P. Corneille’sExam. sur la Medée. If the objection, made by these critics, to the part of the chorus, be,the improbability, as was explained at large in the preceding note,of a slave’s taking the side of virtue against the pleasure of his tyrant, the manifest difference of the two cases will shew it to be without the least foundation. For 1. the chorus in the Medea consists of women, whom compassion and a secret jealousy and indignation at so flagrant an instance of the violated faith of marriage, attach, by the most natural connexion of interests, to the cause and person of the injured queen. In the Antigone, it is composed of old courtiers, devoted, by an habitude of slavery, to the will of a master, assembled, by his express appointment, as creatures of his tyranny, and, prompted, by no strong movements of self-love, to take part against him. 2. In the Antigone, the part of Creon isprincipal. Every step, in the progress of the play, depends so immediately upon him, that he is almost constantly upon the stage. No reflexions could therefore be made by the chorus, nor any part against him be undertaken, but directly in his presence, and at their own manifest hazard. The very reverse of this is the case in the Medea. Creon is there but a subaltern person—has a very small part assigned him in the conduct of the play—is, in fact, introduced upon the stage but in one single scene. The different situation of the chorus, resulting from hence, gives occasion for the widest difference in their conduct. They may speak their resentments freely. Unawed by the frowns and menaces of their tyrant, they are left at liberty to follow the suggestions of virtue. Nothing here offends against the law of probability, or, in the least, contradicts the reasoning about the chorus in the Antigone.16See note on v. 127.17For her own sake, as is pleaded,and in obedience to the laws,Σέ τ’ ὠφελεῖν θέλουσα, καὶ νόμοις βροτῶνΞυλλαμβάνουσα, δρᾷν σ’ ἀπεννέπω τάδε.v. 812.which shews, that the other murders were not against the spirit of the laws, whatever became of the letter of them.18P. Brumoy, Disc. sur le parall. des Theat. p. 165. Amst. 1732.19Imitations of Horaceby Thomas Nevile, M. A. Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, 1758.20There is a considerable difference in the copies of this ode, as given us in the best editions of Athenæus and Diogenes Laertius. But theSIXTHverse is, in all of them, so inexplicable, in respect of themeasure, theconstruction, and thesense, that I have no doubt of its being extremely corrupt. In such a case one may be indulged in making conjectures. And the following one, by a learned person, exactly skilled in the proprieties as well as elegancies of the Greek language, is so reasonable, that I had almost ventured to give it a place in the text.The Poet had been celebrating v. 3. the divineformof virtue; which inspired the Grecian youth with an invincible courage and contempt of danger. It was natural therefore to conclude his panegyric with some such Epiphonema as this: “Such a passion do’st thou kindle up in the minds of men!”To justify this passion, he next turns to thefruits, or advantages which virtue yields; which, he tells us, are more excellent than those we receive from any other possession, whether ofwealth,nobility, orease, the three great idols of mankind. Something like this we collect from the obscure glimmerings of sense that occur to us from the common reading,Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρένα βάλλεις καρπόν τ’ εἰς ἀθάνατον,Χρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω, &c.But it is plain, then, that a very material word must have dropt out of thefirstpart of the line, and that there is an evident corruption in thelast. In a word, the whole passage may be reformed thus,Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρέν’ ἜΡΩΤΑ βάλλεις.Καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ ἀθάνατονΧρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω καὶ γονέων,Μαλακαυγητοῖό θ’ ὕπνου.It need not be observed how easily καρπὸν ΤΕΕΙΣ is changed into καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ: And as to the restored word ἔρωτα, besides the necessity of it to complete the sense, it exactly suits with σοῖς τε πόθοις in v. 12. Lastly, themeasurewill now sufficiently justify itself to the learned reader.21Agite, fugite, quatite, Satyri: A verse cited from one of these Latin satyrs by Marius Victorinus.22This, I think, must be the interpretation ofsensibus celebrem, supposing it to be the true reading. But a learned critic has shewn with great appearance of reason, that the text is corrupt and should be reformed intosensibusCELEREM. According to which reading the encomium here past on Pomponius must be understood of hisWit, and not the gravity of his moral Sentences. Either way his title to the honour of Invention is just the same.—See a Specimen of a new Edition of Paterculus inBibliotheque Britannique,Juillet, &c.1736.23In the library of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.24Mr. Hume,Of Simplicity and Refinement.25And no wonder, when, as Suetonius tells us, the emperor himself was so delighted with the old comedy. [c. 89.]26This is further confirmed from Lucian, who, in the description of a splendid feast in his ΑΛΕΚΤΡΥΩΝ, and in theSymposium of hisΛΑΠΙΘΑΙ, brings in the ΓΕΛΩΤΟΠΟΙΟΙ as necessary attendants on the entertainment.—But the reader will not take what is said of thefine satyrof Xenophon’s Symposium, who hath not observed, that this sort of compositions, which were in great credit with the ancients, are of the nature of dramas, ΗΘΙΚΟΙ ΛΟΓΟΙ, as Aristotle would call them. In which the dialogists, who are real personages as in theold comedy, give a lively, and sometimes exaggerated expression of their own characters. Under thisideaof a Symposium we are prepared to expectbadcharacters as well asgood. Nothing in thekindof composition itself confined the writer to thelatter; and the decorum of afestal conversation, which, in a republic especially, would have a mixture of satyr in it, seemed to demand theformer. We see then the undoubted purpose of Xenophon in the persons of hisJESTERandSyracusian; and of Plato, in those ofAristophanesand some others. Where we may further take notice, that, to prevent the abuse and misconstruction, to which these personated discourses are ever liable, Socrates is brought in to correct the looseness of them, in both dialogues, and in some measure doth the office of the dramatic chorus,BONIS FAVENDI. But it is the less strange that the moderns have not apprehended the genius of theseSymposia, when Athenæus, who professedly criticises them, and one would think, had a better opportunity of knowing their real character, hath betrayed the grossest ignorance about them.—I can but just hint these things, which might afford curious matter for a dissertation. But enough is said to let the intelligent reader into the true secret of theseconvivial dialogues, and to explane the ground of the encomium here passed upononeof them.27“L’étude égale des poëtes de différens tems à plaire à leurs spectateurs, a encore influé dans la maniere de peindre les characters. Ceux qui paroissent sur la scene Angloise, Espagnole, Françoise, sont plus Anglois, Espagnols, ou François que Grecs ou Romains, en un mot que ce qu’ils doivent être. Il ne faut qu’en peu discernement pour s’appercevoir que nos Césars et nos Achilles, en gardant même une partie de leur caractere primitif, prennent droit de naturalité dans le païs où ils sont transplantez, semblables à ces portraits, qui sortent de la main d’un peintre Flamand, Italien, ou François, et qui portent l’empreinte du païs. On veut plaire à sa nation, et rien ne plait tant que la resemblance de manieres et de genie.” [P. Brumoy, vol. i. p. 200.]28Dionys. Halicarn Ep. ad C. Pomp.p. 205.Edit. Huds.29In conformity with theAntique.Nec enim Phidias, cum faceret Jovis formam aut Minervæ, contemplabatur aliquem e quo similitudinem duceret: sed ipsius in mente incidebatspecies pulchritudinis eximia quædam,quam intuens in eaque defixus ad illius similitudinem artem et manum dirigebat[Cic. Orat. 2.]30SirWilliam Temple.31ἼΩΝ.32Pope’s Works, vol. V. p. 244. 8vo.33Quinctilian, lib. xi. c. 1.34Θεῷ ἀνικήτῳ ἐπιγράψαντες. Though, to complete the farce, it was with the greatest shyness and reluctance, that the humility of these lords of the universe could permit itself to accept the ensigns of deity, as the court-historians of those times are forward to inform us. An affectation, which was thought to sit so well upon them, that we find it afterwards practised, in the absurdest and most impudent manner, by the worst of their successors.35See a learned and accurate dissertation on the subject inHist. de l’acad. des inscr.&c. tom. i.36Div. Leg.vol. i. B. ii. S. 4.37In these lines,Mox tamen ardentes accingar dicere pugnasCaesaris, et nomen famâ tot ferre per annos,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.Which I suspect not to have been from the hand of Virgil. And,I. On account of somepeculiarities in the expression.1.Accingaris of frequent use in the best authors, to denotea readiness and resolution to do any thing; but as joined with aninfinitive mood, accingar dicere, I do not remember to have ever seen it. ’Tis often used by Virgil, but, if the several places be consulted, it will always be found with anaccusativeandpreposition, expressed, or understood, asmagicas accingier artes, or with anaccusativeanddative, asaccingere se praedae, or lastly, with anablative, expressing theinstrument, asaccingor ferro.La Cerda, in his notes upon the place, seemed sensible of the objection, and therefore wrote,Graeca locutio: the common, but paltry, shift of learned critics, when they determine, at any rate, to support an ancient reading.2.Ardentes pugnas,burning battles, sounds well enough to a modern ear, but I much doubt, if it would have passed in the times of Virgil. At least, I recollect no such expression in all his works;ardensbeing constantly joined to a word, denoting asubstanceof apparentlight,heat, orflame, to which the allusion is easy, asardentes gladios,ardentes oculos,campos armis sublimibus ardentes, and, by an easy metaphor,ardentes hostes, but no where, that I can find, to soabstracta notion, as that offight. It seems to be to avoid this difficulty, that some have chosen to readardentis, in thegenitive, which yet Servius rejects as of no authority.3. But the most glaring note of illegitimacy is in the line,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.It has puzzled all the commentators from old Servius down to the learned Mr. Martyn, to give any tolerable account of the poet’s choice ofTithonus, from whom to derive the ancestry of Augustus, rather thanAnchises, orAssaracus, who were not only more famous, but in thedirectline. The pretences of any or all of them are too frivolous to make it necessary to spend a thought about them. The instance stands single in antiquity: much less is there any thing like it to be found in the Augustan poets.II. But thephraseologyof these lines is the least of my objection. Were it ever so accurate, there is besides, on the first view, a manifest absurdity in thesubject-matterof them. For would any writer, of but common skill in the art of composition, close a long and elaborate allegory, the principal grace of which consists in its very mystery, with a cold, and formal explanation of it? Or would he pay so poor a compliment to his patron, as to suppose his sagacity wanted the assistance of this additional triplet to lead him into the true meaning? Nothing can be more abhorrent from the usual address and artifice of Virgil’s manner. Or,III. Were thesubject-matteritself passable, yet, how, in defiance of all the laws ofdisposition, came it to beforcedin here? Let the reader turn to the passage, and he will soon perceive, that this could never be theplacefor it. The allegory being concluded, the poet returns to his subject, which is proposed in the six following lines:Intereà Dryadum sylvas, saltusque sequamurIntactos, tua, Maecenas, haud mollia jussa;Te sine nil altum mens inchoat: en age segnesRumpe moras; vocat ingenti clamore Cithaeron,Taygetique canes, domitrixque Epidaurus equorum,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminata remugit.Would now any one expect, that the poet, after having conducted the reader, thus respectfully, to the very threshold of his subject, should immediately run away again to the point, from which he had set out, and this on so needless an errand, as the letting him into the secret of his allegory?But this inserted triplet agrees as ill with whatfollows, as with whatprecedesit. For how abrupt is the transition, and unlike the delicate connexion, so studiously contrived by the Augustan poets, fromTithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.toSeu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmae, &c.When omit but these interpolated lines, and see how gracefully, and by how natural a succession of ideas, the poet slides into the main of his subject.—Intereà Dryadum silvas saltusque sequamurIntactos—Te sine nil—Rumpe moras: vocat ingenti clamore CithaeronTaygetique canes, domitrixque EpidaurusEQUORUM,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminataREMUGIT.Seu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmaePascitEQUOS;seu quis fortes ad aratraJUVENCOS.On the whole, I have not the least doubt, that the lines before us are the spurious offspring of somelater poet; if indeed the writer of them deserve that name; for, whoever he was, he is so far from partaking of the original spirit of Virgil, that, at most he appears to have been but a servile and paltry mimic of Ovid; from the opening of whose Metamorphosis the design was clearly taken. The turn of the thought is evidently the same in both, and even the expression.Mutatas dicere formasis echoed byardentes dicere pugnas:dicere fert animus, is, by an affected improvement,accingar dicere: andTithoni primâ ab origineis almost literally the same asprimâque ab origine mundi. For theinsertionof these lines in this place, I leave it to the curious to conjecture of it, as they may: but in the mean time, must esteem the office of the truecriticto be so far resembling that of thepoethimself, as, within some proper limitations, to justify thehonestliberty here taken.Cum tabulis animum censoris sumet honesti;Audebit quaecunque parum splendoris habebuntEt sine pondere erunt, et honore indigne feruntur,Verba movere loco; quamvis invita recedant,Et versentur adhuc intra penetralia Vestae.[2 Ep. ii. 110.]38[B. ix. v. 641.]39Notes on the story of Phaëton.[v. 23.]40Jacobi Philippi D’ OrvilleAnimadversiones inCharit. Aphrod.lib. iv. c. 4.41Ibid. vol. ii. p. 325.42D. L. vol. ii. p. 644.43At inspiciamus porrò, quid alii,quibus correctius sapit, de hoc loquendi modoCENSUERINT. Agnoscunt enim, etc. p. 299.44Ibid.45v. 437.46Iliad, Γ. 327.47N. D. ii. 64.48Pag. 397.49Inst. Orat.xi. 3.50There having been such wretches, as the Painter Plutarch speaks of—Χαιρεφάνης, ἀκολάστους ὁμιλίας γυναικῶν πρὸς ἄνδρας. De aud. Poet.51See an essay on theComposition of the Antients, byJ. Geddes, Esq.52Sir Philip Sidney.53Diss. III. vol. ii.

1[A Cross with the initials on a label—I. N. R. I. a Glory above, and the motto below ΕΚ ΠΙΣΤΕΩΣ.]

2“We, the Bishop and Dean and Chapter and Clergy of the Church and Diocese of Worcester, humbly beg leave to present our dutiful respects to your Majesty, and to express the joy we feel on your Majesty’s arrival at this place.“Your presence, Sir, gladdens the hearts of your faithful subjects, wherever you go. But We, the Clergy of this place, have a peculiar cause to rejoice in the honour vouchsafed us at this time; a time, devoted to an excellent charity for the relief of a most deserving, though unfortunate part of our Order. This gracious notice and countenance of us at such a moment, shews, as your whole life has invariably done, your zealous concern for the interests of Religion, and the credit of its Ministers. And we trust, Sir, that we entertain a due sense of this goodness; and that we shall never be wanting in the most dutiful attachment to your Majesty’s sacred person, to your august house, and to your mild and beneficent government.“In our daily celebration of the sacred offices, committed to our charge, we make it our fervent prayer to Almighty God, that He will be pleased to take your Majesty into his special protection; and that your Majesty may live long, very long, in health and honour, to be the blessing and the delight of all your people.”[The above is the substance, and I believe the words, of my address to the King at Worcester, 6th August 1788.]To this address his Majesty was pleased to return an answer, very gracious, personally, to the Bishop himself, and expressive of the highest regard for the Clergy of the Established Church.R. W.

“Your presence, Sir, gladdens the hearts of your faithful subjects, wherever you go. But We, the Clergy of this place, have a peculiar cause to rejoice in the honour vouchsafed us at this time; a time, devoted to an excellent charity for the relief of a most deserving, though unfortunate part of our Order. This gracious notice and countenance of us at such a moment, shews, as your whole life has invariably done, your zealous concern for the interests of Religion, and the credit of its Ministers. And we trust, Sir, that we entertain a due sense of this goodness; and that we shall never be wanting in the most dutiful attachment to your Majesty’s sacred person, to your august house, and to your mild and beneficent government.

“In our daily celebration of the sacred offices, committed to our charge, we make it our fervent prayer to Almighty God, that He will be pleased to take your Majesty into his special protection; and that your Majesty may live long, very long, in health and honour, to be the blessing and the delight of all your people.”

[The above is the substance, and I believe the words, of my address to the King at Worcester, 6th August 1788.]

To this address his Majesty was pleased to return an answer, very gracious, personally, to the Bishop himself, and expressive of the highest regard for the Clergy of the Established Church.

R. W.

3[Edward Foley, Esq. Member of Parliament for the County, and William Langford, D. D. late Prebendary of Worcester.]

4The Reverend Mr.Budworth, Head-Master of the Grammar School atBrewood, in Staffordshire. He died in 1745.

5Satyra hæc est in sui sæculi poetas,PRÆCIPUEvero in Romanum drama. Baxter.

6Præf. inLIB. POET.et l. vi. p. 338.

7Mærorem minui, says Tully, grieving for the loss of his daughter,dolorem nec potui, nec, si possem,VELLEM. [Ep. ad Att. xii. 28.] A striking picture of real grief!

8Vel tibi composita canteturEpistolavoce;Ignotum hoc aliis ille novavit opus.Art. Amat.l. iii. v. 345.9J. Scaliger says,Epistolas, Græcorum more, Phocylidæ atque Theognidis[Horatius]scripsit: præceptis philosophiæ divulsis minimeque inter se cohærentibus. And ofthisEpistle, in particular, he presumes to say,De Arte quæres quid sentiam. Quid? Equidem quod de Arte sine arte traditâ.And to the same purpose another great Critic;Non solum antiquorum ὑποθηκαι in moralibus hoc habuere, ut ἀκολουθίαν non servarent, sed etiam alia de quibuscunque rebus præcepta. Sic Epistola Horatii ad Pisones de Poëticâ perpetuum ordinem seriemqueNULLAMhabet; sed ab uno præcepto ad aliud transilit, quamvisNULLAsit materiæ affinitas ad sensum connectendum.[Salmasii Not. in Epictetum et Simplicium, p. 13.Lugd. Bat.1640.]10SeeVictor. Comm. in Dem. Phaler.p. 73.Florent.1594.11The reader may see a fine speech in the Cyropædia of Xenophon [l. iv.] where not so much as this is observed.12SeeRobert Stephens’s Fragm. Vet. Latinorum.13SirPhilip Sidney.14Quel avantage ne peut il [le poëte] pas tirer d’une troupe d’acteurs, qui remplissent sa scene, qui rendent plus sensible la continuité de l’action, et qui la font paroitreVRAISEMBLABLE,puisqu’il n’est pas naturel qu’elle se passe sans temoins. On ne sent que trop le vuide de notre Théatre sans chœurs, &c.[Le Théatre des Grecs, vol. i. p. 105.]15See also to the same purpose P. Corneille’sExam. sur la Medée. If the objection, made by these critics, to the part of the chorus, be,the improbability, as was explained at large in the preceding note,of a slave’s taking the side of virtue against the pleasure of his tyrant, the manifest difference of the two cases will shew it to be without the least foundation. For 1. the chorus in the Medea consists of women, whom compassion and a secret jealousy and indignation at so flagrant an instance of the violated faith of marriage, attach, by the most natural connexion of interests, to the cause and person of the injured queen. In the Antigone, it is composed of old courtiers, devoted, by an habitude of slavery, to the will of a master, assembled, by his express appointment, as creatures of his tyranny, and, prompted, by no strong movements of self-love, to take part against him. 2. In the Antigone, the part of Creon isprincipal. Every step, in the progress of the play, depends so immediately upon him, that he is almost constantly upon the stage. No reflexions could therefore be made by the chorus, nor any part against him be undertaken, but directly in his presence, and at their own manifest hazard. The very reverse of this is the case in the Medea. Creon is there but a subaltern person—has a very small part assigned him in the conduct of the play—is, in fact, introduced upon the stage but in one single scene. The different situation of the chorus, resulting from hence, gives occasion for the widest difference in their conduct. They may speak their resentments freely. Unawed by the frowns and menaces of their tyrant, they are left at liberty to follow the suggestions of virtue. Nothing here offends against the law of probability, or, in the least, contradicts the reasoning about the chorus in the Antigone.16See note on v. 127.17For her own sake, as is pleaded,and in obedience to the laws,Σέ τ’ ὠφελεῖν θέλουσα, καὶ νόμοις βροτῶνΞυλλαμβάνουσα, δρᾷν σ’ ἀπεννέπω τάδε.v. 812.which shews, that the other murders were not against the spirit of the laws, whatever became of the letter of them.18P. Brumoy, Disc. sur le parall. des Theat. p. 165. Amst. 1732.19Imitations of Horaceby Thomas Nevile, M. A. Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, 1758.20There is a considerable difference in the copies of this ode, as given us in the best editions of Athenæus and Diogenes Laertius. But theSIXTHverse is, in all of them, so inexplicable, in respect of themeasure, theconstruction, and thesense, that I have no doubt of its being extremely corrupt. In such a case one may be indulged in making conjectures. And the following one, by a learned person, exactly skilled in the proprieties as well as elegancies of the Greek language, is so reasonable, that I had almost ventured to give it a place in the text.The Poet had been celebrating v. 3. the divineformof virtue; which inspired the Grecian youth with an invincible courage and contempt of danger. It was natural therefore to conclude his panegyric with some such Epiphonema as this: “Such a passion do’st thou kindle up in the minds of men!”To justify this passion, he next turns to thefruits, or advantages which virtue yields; which, he tells us, are more excellent than those we receive from any other possession, whether ofwealth,nobility, orease, the three great idols of mankind. Something like this we collect from the obscure glimmerings of sense that occur to us from the common reading,Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρένα βάλλεις καρπόν τ’ εἰς ἀθάνατον,Χρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω, &c.But it is plain, then, that a very material word must have dropt out of thefirstpart of the line, and that there is an evident corruption in thelast. In a word, the whole passage may be reformed thus,Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρέν’ ἜΡΩΤΑ βάλλεις.Καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ ἀθάνατονΧρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω καὶ γονέων,Μαλακαυγητοῖό θ’ ὕπνου.It need not be observed how easily καρπὸν ΤΕΕΙΣ is changed into καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ: And as to the restored word ἔρωτα, besides the necessity of it to complete the sense, it exactly suits with σοῖς τε πόθοις in v. 12. Lastly, themeasurewill now sufficiently justify itself to the learned reader.21Agite, fugite, quatite, Satyri: A verse cited from one of these Latin satyrs by Marius Victorinus.22This, I think, must be the interpretation ofsensibus celebrem, supposing it to be the true reading. But a learned critic has shewn with great appearance of reason, that the text is corrupt and should be reformed intosensibusCELEREM. According to which reading the encomium here past on Pomponius must be understood of hisWit, and not the gravity of his moral Sentences. Either way his title to the honour of Invention is just the same.—See a Specimen of a new Edition of Paterculus inBibliotheque Britannique,Juillet, &c.1736.23In the library of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.24Mr. Hume,Of Simplicity and Refinement.25And no wonder, when, as Suetonius tells us, the emperor himself was so delighted with the old comedy. [c. 89.]26This is further confirmed from Lucian, who, in the description of a splendid feast in his ΑΛΕΚΤΡΥΩΝ, and in theSymposium of hisΛΑΠΙΘΑΙ, brings in the ΓΕΛΩΤΟΠΟΙΟΙ as necessary attendants on the entertainment.—But the reader will not take what is said of thefine satyrof Xenophon’s Symposium, who hath not observed, that this sort of compositions, which were in great credit with the ancients, are of the nature of dramas, ΗΘΙΚΟΙ ΛΟΓΟΙ, as Aristotle would call them. In which the dialogists, who are real personages as in theold comedy, give a lively, and sometimes exaggerated expression of their own characters. Under thisideaof a Symposium we are prepared to expectbadcharacters as well asgood. Nothing in thekindof composition itself confined the writer to thelatter; and the decorum of afestal conversation, which, in a republic especially, would have a mixture of satyr in it, seemed to demand theformer. We see then the undoubted purpose of Xenophon in the persons of hisJESTERandSyracusian; and of Plato, in those ofAristophanesand some others. Where we may further take notice, that, to prevent the abuse and misconstruction, to which these personated discourses are ever liable, Socrates is brought in to correct the looseness of them, in both dialogues, and in some measure doth the office of the dramatic chorus,BONIS FAVENDI. But it is the less strange that the moderns have not apprehended the genius of theseSymposia, when Athenæus, who professedly criticises them, and one would think, had a better opportunity of knowing their real character, hath betrayed the grossest ignorance about them.—I can but just hint these things, which might afford curious matter for a dissertation. But enough is said to let the intelligent reader into the true secret of theseconvivial dialogues, and to explane the ground of the encomium here passed upononeof them.27“L’étude égale des poëtes de différens tems à plaire à leurs spectateurs, a encore influé dans la maniere de peindre les characters. Ceux qui paroissent sur la scene Angloise, Espagnole, Françoise, sont plus Anglois, Espagnols, ou François que Grecs ou Romains, en un mot que ce qu’ils doivent être. Il ne faut qu’en peu discernement pour s’appercevoir que nos Césars et nos Achilles, en gardant même une partie de leur caractere primitif, prennent droit de naturalité dans le païs où ils sont transplantez, semblables à ces portraits, qui sortent de la main d’un peintre Flamand, Italien, ou François, et qui portent l’empreinte du païs. On veut plaire à sa nation, et rien ne plait tant que la resemblance de manieres et de genie.” [P. Brumoy, vol. i. p. 200.]28Dionys. Halicarn Ep. ad C. Pomp.p. 205.Edit. Huds.29In conformity with theAntique.Nec enim Phidias, cum faceret Jovis formam aut Minervæ, contemplabatur aliquem e quo similitudinem duceret: sed ipsius in mente incidebatspecies pulchritudinis eximia quædam,quam intuens in eaque defixus ad illius similitudinem artem et manum dirigebat[Cic. Orat. 2.]30SirWilliam Temple.31ἼΩΝ.32Pope’s Works, vol. V. p. 244. 8vo.33Quinctilian, lib. xi. c. 1.34Θεῷ ἀνικήτῳ ἐπιγράψαντες. Though, to complete the farce, it was with the greatest shyness and reluctance, that the humility of these lords of the universe could permit itself to accept the ensigns of deity, as the court-historians of those times are forward to inform us. An affectation, which was thought to sit so well upon them, that we find it afterwards practised, in the absurdest and most impudent manner, by the worst of their successors.35See a learned and accurate dissertation on the subject inHist. de l’acad. des inscr.&c. tom. i.36Div. Leg.vol. i. B. ii. S. 4.37In these lines,Mox tamen ardentes accingar dicere pugnasCaesaris, et nomen famâ tot ferre per annos,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.Which I suspect not to have been from the hand of Virgil. And,I. On account of somepeculiarities in the expression.1.Accingaris of frequent use in the best authors, to denotea readiness and resolution to do any thing; but as joined with aninfinitive mood, accingar dicere, I do not remember to have ever seen it. ’Tis often used by Virgil, but, if the several places be consulted, it will always be found with anaccusativeandpreposition, expressed, or understood, asmagicas accingier artes, or with anaccusativeanddative, asaccingere se praedae, or lastly, with anablative, expressing theinstrument, asaccingor ferro.La Cerda, in his notes upon the place, seemed sensible of the objection, and therefore wrote,Graeca locutio: the common, but paltry, shift of learned critics, when they determine, at any rate, to support an ancient reading.2.Ardentes pugnas,burning battles, sounds well enough to a modern ear, but I much doubt, if it would have passed in the times of Virgil. At least, I recollect no such expression in all his works;ardensbeing constantly joined to a word, denoting asubstanceof apparentlight,heat, orflame, to which the allusion is easy, asardentes gladios,ardentes oculos,campos armis sublimibus ardentes, and, by an easy metaphor,ardentes hostes, but no where, that I can find, to soabstracta notion, as that offight. It seems to be to avoid this difficulty, that some have chosen to readardentis, in thegenitive, which yet Servius rejects as of no authority.3. But the most glaring note of illegitimacy is in the line,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.It has puzzled all the commentators from old Servius down to the learned Mr. Martyn, to give any tolerable account of the poet’s choice ofTithonus, from whom to derive the ancestry of Augustus, rather thanAnchises, orAssaracus, who were not only more famous, but in thedirectline. The pretences of any or all of them are too frivolous to make it necessary to spend a thought about them. The instance stands single in antiquity: much less is there any thing like it to be found in the Augustan poets.II. But thephraseologyof these lines is the least of my objection. Were it ever so accurate, there is besides, on the first view, a manifest absurdity in thesubject-matterof them. For would any writer, of but common skill in the art of composition, close a long and elaborate allegory, the principal grace of which consists in its very mystery, with a cold, and formal explanation of it? Or would he pay so poor a compliment to his patron, as to suppose his sagacity wanted the assistance of this additional triplet to lead him into the true meaning? Nothing can be more abhorrent from the usual address and artifice of Virgil’s manner. Or,III. Were thesubject-matteritself passable, yet, how, in defiance of all the laws ofdisposition, came it to beforcedin here? Let the reader turn to the passage, and he will soon perceive, that this could never be theplacefor it. The allegory being concluded, the poet returns to his subject, which is proposed in the six following lines:Intereà Dryadum sylvas, saltusque sequamurIntactos, tua, Maecenas, haud mollia jussa;Te sine nil altum mens inchoat: en age segnesRumpe moras; vocat ingenti clamore Cithaeron,Taygetique canes, domitrixque Epidaurus equorum,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminata remugit.Would now any one expect, that the poet, after having conducted the reader, thus respectfully, to the very threshold of his subject, should immediately run away again to the point, from which he had set out, and this on so needless an errand, as the letting him into the secret of his allegory?But this inserted triplet agrees as ill with whatfollows, as with whatprecedesit. For how abrupt is the transition, and unlike the delicate connexion, so studiously contrived by the Augustan poets, fromTithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.toSeu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmae, &c.When omit but these interpolated lines, and see how gracefully, and by how natural a succession of ideas, the poet slides into the main of his subject.—Intereà Dryadum silvas saltusque sequamurIntactos—Te sine nil—Rumpe moras: vocat ingenti clamore CithaeronTaygetique canes, domitrixque EpidaurusEQUORUM,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminataREMUGIT.Seu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmaePascitEQUOS;seu quis fortes ad aratraJUVENCOS.On the whole, I have not the least doubt, that the lines before us are the spurious offspring of somelater poet; if indeed the writer of them deserve that name; for, whoever he was, he is so far from partaking of the original spirit of Virgil, that, at most he appears to have been but a servile and paltry mimic of Ovid; from the opening of whose Metamorphosis the design was clearly taken. The turn of the thought is evidently the same in both, and even the expression.Mutatas dicere formasis echoed byardentes dicere pugnas:dicere fert animus, is, by an affected improvement,accingar dicere: andTithoni primâ ab origineis almost literally the same asprimâque ab origine mundi. For theinsertionof these lines in this place, I leave it to the curious to conjecture of it, as they may: but in the mean time, must esteem the office of the truecriticto be so far resembling that of thepoethimself, as, within some proper limitations, to justify thehonestliberty here taken.Cum tabulis animum censoris sumet honesti;Audebit quaecunque parum splendoris habebuntEt sine pondere erunt, et honore indigne feruntur,Verba movere loco; quamvis invita recedant,Et versentur adhuc intra penetralia Vestae.[2 Ep. ii. 110.]38[B. ix. v. 641.]39Notes on the story of Phaëton.[v. 23.]40Jacobi Philippi D’ OrvilleAnimadversiones inCharit. Aphrod.lib. iv. c. 4.41Ibid. vol. ii. p. 325.42D. L. vol. ii. p. 644.43At inspiciamus porrò, quid alii,quibus correctius sapit, de hoc loquendi modoCENSUERINT. Agnoscunt enim, etc. p. 299.44Ibid.45v. 437.46Iliad, Γ. 327.47N. D. ii. 64.48Pag. 397.49Inst. Orat.xi. 3.50There having been such wretches, as the Painter Plutarch speaks of—Χαιρεφάνης, ἀκολάστους ὁμιλίας γυναικῶν πρὸς ἄνδρας. De aud. Poet.51See an essay on theComposition of the Antients, byJ. Geddes, Esq.52Sir Philip Sidney.53Diss. III. vol. ii.

Vel tibi composita canteturEpistolavoce;Ignotum hoc aliis ille novavit opus.Art. Amat.l. iii. v. 345.

9J. Scaliger says,Epistolas, Græcorum more, Phocylidæ atque Theognidis[Horatius]scripsit: præceptis philosophiæ divulsis minimeque inter se cohærentibus. And ofthisEpistle, in particular, he presumes to say,De Arte quæres quid sentiam. Quid? Equidem quod de Arte sine arte traditâ.And to the same purpose another great Critic;Non solum antiquorum ὑποθηκαι in moralibus hoc habuere, ut ἀκολουθίαν non servarent, sed etiam alia de quibuscunque rebus præcepta. Sic Epistola Horatii ad Pisones de Poëticâ perpetuum ordinem seriemqueNULLAMhabet; sed ab uno præcepto ad aliud transilit, quamvisNULLAsit materiæ affinitas ad sensum connectendum.[Salmasii Not. in Epictetum et Simplicium, p. 13.Lugd. Bat.1640.]

10SeeVictor. Comm. in Dem. Phaler.p. 73.Florent.1594.

11The reader may see a fine speech in the Cyropædia of Xenophon [l. iv.] where not so much as this is observed.

12SeeRobert Stephens’s Fragm. Vet. Latinorum.

13SirPhilip Sidney.

14Quel avantage ne peut il [le poëte] pas tirer d’une troupe d’acteurs, qui remplissent sa scene, qui rendent plus sensible la continuité de l’action, et qui la font paroitreVRAISEMBLABLE,puisqu’il n’est pas naturel qu’elle se passe sans temoins. On ne sent que trop le vuide de notre Théatre sans chœurs, &c.[Le Théatre des Grecs, vol. i. p. 105.]

15See also to the same purpose P. Corneille’sExam. sur la Medée. If the objection, made by these critics, to the part of the chorus, be,the improbability, as was explained at large in the preceding note,of a slave’s taking the side of virtue against the pleasure of his tyrant, the manifest difference of the two cases will shew it to be without the least foundation. For 1. the chorus in the Medea consists of women, whom compassion and a secret jealousy and indignation at so flagrant an instance of the violated faith of marriage, attach, by the most natural connexion of interests, to the cause and person of the injured queen. In the Antigone, it is composed of old courtiers, devoted, by an habitude of slavery, to the will of a master, assembled, by his express appointment, as creatures of his tyranny, and, prompted, by no strong movements of self-love, to take part against him. 2. In the Antigone, the part of Creon isprincipal. Every step, in the progress of the play, depends so immediately upon him, that he is almost constantly upon the stage. No reflexions could therefore be made by the chorus, nor any part against him be undertaken, but directly in his presence, and at their own manifest hazard. The very reverse of this is the case in the Medea. Creon is there but a subaltern person—has a very small part assigned him in the conduct of the play—is, in fact, introduced upon the stage but in one single scene. The different situation of the chorus, resulting from hence, gives occasion for the widest difference in their conduct. They may speak their resentments freely. Unawed by the frowns and menaces of their tyrant, they are left at liberty to follow the suggestions of virtue. Nothing here offends against the law of probability, or, in the least, contradicts the reasoning about the chorus in the Antigone.

16See note on v. 127.

17For her own sake, as is pleaded,and in obedience to the laws,Σέ τ’ ὠφελεῖν θέλουσα, καὶ νόμοις βροτῶνΞυλλαμβάνουσα, δρᾷν σ’ ἀπεννέπω τάδε.v. 812.which shews, that the other murders were not against the spirit of the laws, whatever became of the letter of them.

17For her own sake, as is pleaded,and in obedience to the laws,

Σέ τ’ ὠφελεῖν θέλουσα, καὶ νόμοις βροτῶνΞυλλαμβάνουσα, δρᾷν σ’ ἀπεννέπω τάδε.v. 812.

which shews, that the other murders were not against the spirit of the laws, whatever became of the letter of them.

18P. Brumoy, Disc. sur le parall. des Theat. p. 165. Amst. 1732.

19Imitations of Horaceby Thomas Nevile, M. A. Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, 1758.

20There is a considerable difference in the copies of this ode, as given us in the best editions of Athenæus and Diogenes Laertius. But theSIXTHverse is, in all of them, so inexplicable, in respect of themeasure, theconstruction, and thesense, that I have no doubt of its being extremely corrupt. In such a case one may be indulged in making conjectures. And the following one, by a learned person, exactly skilled in the proprieties as well as elegancies of the Greek language, is so reasonable, that I had almost ventured to give it a place in the text.The Poet had been celebrating v. 3. the divineformof virtue; which inspired the Grecian youth with an invincible courage and contempt of danger. It was natural therefore to conclude his panegyric with some such Epiphonema as this: “Such a passion do’st thou kindle up in the minds of men!”To justify this passion, he next turns to thefruits, or advantages which virtue yields; which, he tells us, are more excellent than those we receive from any other possession, whether ofwealth,nobility, orease, the three great idols of mankind. Something like this we collect from the obscure glimmerings of sense that occur to us from the common reading,Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρένα βάλλεις καρπόν τ’ εἰς ἀθάνατον,Χρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω, &c.But it is plain, then, that a very material word must have dropt out of thefirstpart of the line, and that there is an evident corruption in thelast. In a word, the whole passage may be reformed thus,Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρέν’ ἜΡΩΤΑ βάλλεις.Καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ ἀθάνατονΧρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω καὶ γονέων,Μαλακαυγητοῖό θ’ ὕπνου.It need not be observed how easily καρπὸν ΤΕΕΙΣ is changed into καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ: And as to the restored word ἔρωτα, besides the necessity of it to complete the sense, it exactly suits with σοῖς τε πόθοις in v. 12. Lastly, themeasurewill now sufficiently justify itself to the learned reader.

The Poet had been celebrating v. 3. the divineformof virtue; which inspired the Grecian youth with an invincible courage and contempt of danger. It was natural therefore to conclude his panegyric with some such Epiphonema as this: “Such a passion do’st thou kindle up in the minds of men!”

To justify this passion, he next turns to thefruits, or advantages which virtue yields; which, he tells us, are more excellent than those we receive from any other possession, whether ofwealth,nobility, orease, the three great idols of mankind. Something like this we collect from the obscure glimmerings of sense that occur to us from the common reading,

Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρένα βάλλεις καρπόν τ’ εἰς ἀθάνατον,Χρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω, &c.

But it is plain, then, that a very material word must have dropt out of thefirstpart of the line, and that there is an evident corruption in thelast. In a word, the whole passage may be reformed thus,

Τοῖον ἐπὶ φρέν’ ἜΡΩΤΑ βάλλεις.Καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ ἀθάνατονΧρυσοῦ τε κρέσσω καὶ γονέων,Μαλακαυγητοῖό θ’ ὕπνου.

It need not be observed how easily καρπὸν ΤΕΕΙΣ is changed into καρπὸν ΦΕΡΕΙΣ: And as to the restored word ἔρωτα, besides the necessity of it to complete the sense, it exactly suits with σοῖς τε πόθοις in v. 12. Lastly, themeasurewill now sufficiently justify itself to the learned reader.

21Agite, fugite, quatite, Satyri: A verse cited from one of these Latin satyrs by Marius Victorinus.

22This, I think, must be the interpretation ofsensibus celebrem, supposing it to be the true reading. But a learned critic has shewn with great appearance of reason, that the text is corrupt and should be reformed intosensibusCELEREM. According to which reading the encomium here past on Pomponius must be understood of hisWit, and not the gravity of his moral Sentences. Either way his title to the honour of Invention is just the same.—See a Specimen of a new Edition of Paterculus inBibliotheque Britannique,Juillet, &c.1736.

23In the library of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.

24Mr. Hume,Of Simplicity and Refinement.

25And no wonder, when, as Suetonius tells us, the emperor himself was so delighted with the old comedy. [c. 89.]

26This is further confirmed from Lucian, who, in the description of a splendid feast in his ΑΛΕΚΤΡΥΩΝ, and in theSymposium of hisΛΑΠΙΘΑΙ, brings in the ΓΕΛΩΤΟΠΟΙΟΙ as necessary attendants on the entertainment.—But the reader will not take what is said of thefine satyrof Xenophon’s Symposium, who hath not observed, that this sort of compositions, which were in great credit with the ancients, are of the nature of dramas, ΗΘΙΚΟΙ ΛΟΓΟΙ, as Aristotle would call them. In which the dialogists, who are real personages as in theold comedy, give a lively, and sometimes exaggerated expression of their own characters. Under thisideaof a Symposium we are prepared to expectbadcharacters as well asgood. Nothing in thekindof composition itself confined the writer to thelatter; and the decorum of afestal conversation, which, in a republic especially, would have a mixture of satyr in it, seemed to demand theformer. We see then the undoubted purpose of Xenophon in the persons of hisJESTERandSyracusian; and of Plato, in those ofAristophanesand some others. Where we may further take notice, that, to prevent the abuse and misconstruction, to which these personated discourses are ever liable, Socrates is brought in to correct the looseness of them, in both dialogues, and in some measure doth the office of the dramatic chorus,BONIS FAVENDI. But it is the less strange that the moderns have not apprehended the genius of theseSymposia, when Athenæus, who professedly criticises them, and one would think, had a better opportunity of knowing their real character, hath betrayed the grossest ignorance about them.—I can but just hint these things, which might afford curious matter for a dissertation. But enough is said to let the intelligent reader into the true secret of theseconvivial dialogues, and to explane the ground of the encomium here passed upononeof them.

27“L’étude égale des poëtes de différens tems à plaire à leurs spectateurs, a encore influé dans la maniere de peindre les characters. Ceux qui paroissent sur la scene Angloise, Espagnole, Françoise, sont plus Anglois, Espagnols, ou François que Grecs ou Romains, en un mot que ce qu’ils doivent être. Il ne faut qu’en peu discernement pour s’appercevoir que nos Césars et nos Achilles, en gardant même une partie de leur caractere primitif, prennent droit de naturalité dans le païs où ils sont transplantez, semblables à ces portraits, qui sortent de la main d’un peintre Flamand, Italien, ou François, et qui portent l’empreinte du païs. On veut plaire à sa nation, et rien ne plait tant que la resemblance de manieres et de genie.” [P. Brumoy, vol. i. p. 200.]

28Dionys. Halicarn Ep. ad C. Pomp.p. 205.Edit. Huds.

29In conformity with theAntique.Nec enim Phidias, cum faceret Jovis formam aut Minervæ, contemplabatur aliquem e quo similitudinem duceret: sed ipsius in mente incidebatspecies pulchritudinis eximia quædam,quam intuens in eaque defixus ad illius similitudinem artem et manum dirigebat[Cic. Orat. 2.]

30SirWilliam Temple.

31ἼΩΝ.

32Pope’s Works, vol. V. p. 244. 8vo.

33Quinctilian, lib. xi. c. 1.

34Θεῷ ἀνικήτῳ ἐπιγράψαντες. Though, to complete the farce, it was with the greatest shyness and reluctance, that the humility of these lords of the universe could permit itself to accept the ensigns of deity, as the court-historians of those times are forward to inform us. An affectation, which was thought to sit so well upon them, that we find it afterwards practised, in the absurdest and most impudent manner, by the worst of their successors.

35See a learned and accurate dissertation on the subject inHist. de l’acad. des inscr.&c. tom. i.

36Div. Leg.vol. i. B. ii. S. 4.

37In these lines,Mox tamen ardentes accingar dicere pugnasCaesaris, et nomen famâ tot ferre per annos,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.Which I suspect not to have been from the hand of Virgil. And,I. On account of somepeculiarities in the expression.1.Accingaris of frequent use in the best authors, to denotea readiness and resolution to do any thing; but as joined with aninfinitive mood, accingar dicere, I do not remember to have ever seen it. ’Tis often used by Virgil, but, if the several places be consulted, it will always be found with anaccusativeandpreposition, expressed, or understood, asmagicas accingier artes, or with anaccusativeanddative, asaccingere se praedae, or lastly, with anablative, expressing theinstrument, asaccingor ferro.La Cerda, in his notes upon the place, seemed sensible of the objection, and therefore wrote,Graeca locutio: the common, but paltry, shift of learned critics, when they determine, at any rate, to support an ancient reading.2.Ardentes pugnas,burning battles, sounds well enough to a modern ear, but I much doubt, if it would have passed in the times of Virgil. At least, I recollect no such expression in all his works;ardensbeing constantly joined to a word, denoting asubstanceof apparentlight,heat, orflame, to which the allusion is easy, asardentes gladios,ardentes oculos,campos armis sublimibus ardentes, and, by an easy metaphor,ardentes hostes, but no where, that I can find, to soabstracta notion, as that offight. It seems to be to avoid this difficulty, that some have chosen to readardentis, in thegenitive, which yet Servius rejects as of no authority.3. But the most glaring note of illegitimacy is in the line,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.It has puzzled all the commentators from old Servius down to the learned Mr. Martyn, to give any tolerable account of the poet’s choice ofTithonus, from whom to derive the ancestry of Augustus, rather thanAnchises, orAssaracus, who were not only more famous, but in thedirectline. The pretences of any or all of them are too frivolous to make it necessary to spend a thought about them. The instance stands single in antiquity: much less is there any thing like it to be found in the Augustan poets.II. But thephraseologyof these lines is the least of my objection. Were it ever so accurate, there is besides, on the first view, a manifest absurdity in thesubject-matterof them. For would any writer, of but common skill in the art of composition, close a long and elaborate allegory, the principal grace of which consists in its very mystery, with a cold, and formal explanation of it? Or would he pay so poor a compliment to his patron, as to suppose his sagacity wanted the assistance of this additional triplet to lead him into the true meaning? Nothing can be more abhorrent from the usual address and artifice of Virgil’s manner. Or,III. Were thesubject-matteritself passable, yet, how, in defiance of all the laws ofdisposition, came it to beforcedin here? Let the reader turn to the passage, and he will soon perceive, that this could never be theplacefor it. The allegory being concluded, the poet returns to his subject, which is proposed in the six following lines:Intereà Dryadum sylvas, saltusque sequamurIntactos, tua, Maecenas, haud mollia jussa;Te sine nil altum mens inchoat: en age segnesRumpe moras; vocat ingenti clamore Cithaeron,Taygetique canes, domitrixque Epidaurus equorum,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminata remugit.Would now any one expect, that the poet, after having conducted the reader, thus respectfully, to the very threshold of his subject, should immediately run away again to the point, from which he had set out, and this on so needless an errand, as the letting him into the secret of his allegory?But this inserted triplet agrees as ill with whatfollows, as with whatprecedesit. For how abrupt is the transition, and unlike the delicate connexion, so studiously contrived by the Augustan poets, fromTithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.toSeu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmae, &c.When omit but these interpolated lines, and see how gracefully, and by how natural a succession of ideas, the poet slides into the main of his subject.—Intereà Dryadum silvas saltusque sequamurIntactos—Te sine nil—Rumpe moras: vocat ingenti clamore CithaeronTaygetique canes, domitrixque EpidaurusEQUORUM,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminataREMUGIT.Seu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmaePascitEQUOS;seu quis fortes ad aratraJUVENCOS.On the whole, I have not the least doubt, that the lines before us are the spurious offspring of somelater poet; if indeed the writer of them deserve that name; for, whoever he was, he is so far from partaking of the original spirit of Virgil, that, at most he appears to have been but a servile and paltry mimic of Ovid; from the opening of whose Metamorphosis the design was clearly taken. The turn of the thought is evidently the same in both, and even the expression.Mutatas dicere formasis echoed byardentes dicere pugnas:dicere fert animus, is, by an affected improvement,accingar dicere: andTithoni primâ ab origineis almost literally the same asprimâque ab origine mundi. For theinsertionof these lines in this place, I leave it to the curious to conjecture of it, as they may: but in the mean time, must esteem the office of the truecriticto be so far resembling that of thepoethimself, as, within some proper limitations, to justify thehonestliberty here taken.Cum tabulis animum censoris sumet honesti;Audebit quaecunque parum splendoris habebuntEt sine pondere erunt, et honore indigne feruntur,Verba movere loco; quamvis invita recedant,Et versentur adhuc intra penetralia Vestae.[2 Ep. ii. 110.]

37In these lines,

Mox tamen ardentes accingar dicere pugnasCaesaris, et nomen famâ tot ferre per annos,Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.

Which I suspect not to have been from the hand of Virgil. And,

I. On account of somepeculiarities in the expression.

1.Accingaris of frequent use in the best authors, to denotea readiness and resolution to do any thing; but as joined with aninfinitive mood, accingar dicere, I do not remember to have ever seen it. ’Tis often used by Virgil, but, if the several places be consulted, it will always be found with anaccusativeandpreposition, expressed, or understood, asmagicas accingier artes, or with anaccusativeanddative, asaccingere se praedae, or lastly, with anablative, expressing theinstrument, asaccingor ferro.La Cerda, in his notes upon the place, seemed sensible of the objection, and therefore wrote,Graeca locutio: the common, but paltry, shift of learned critics, when they determine, at any rate, to support an ancient reading.

2.Ardentes pugnas,burning battles, sounds well enough to a modern ear, but I much doubt, if it would have passed in the times of Virgil. At least, I recollect no such expression in all his works;ardensbeing constantly joined to a word, denoting asubstanceof apparentlight,heat, orflame, to which the allusion is easy, asardentes gladios,ardentes oculos,campos armis sublimibus ardentes, and, by an easy metaphor,ardentes hostes, but no where, that I can find, to soabstracta notion, as that offight. It seems to be to avoid this difficulty, that some have chosen to readardentis, in thegenitive, which yet Servius rejects as of no authority.

3. But the most glaring note of illegitimacy is in the line,

Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.

It has puzzled all the commentators from old Servius down to the learned Mr. Martyn, to give any tolerable account of the poet’s choice ofTithonus, from whom to derive the ancestry of Augustus, rather thanAnchises, orAssaracus, who were not only more famous, but in thedirectline. The pretences of any or all of them are too frivolous to make it necessary to spend a thought about them. The instance stands single in antiquity: much less is there any thing like it to be found in the Augustan poets.

II. But thephraseologyof these lines is the least of my objection. Were it ever so accurate, there is besides, on the first view, a manifest absurdity in thesubject-matterof them. For would any writer, of but common skill in the art of composition, close a long and elaborate allegory, the principal grace of which consists in its very mystery, with a cold, and formal explanation of it? Or would he pay so poor a compliment to his patron, as to suppose his sagacity wanted the assistance of this additional triplet to lead him into the true meaning? Nothing can be more abhorrent from the usual address and artifice of Virgil’s manner. Or,

III. Were thesubject-matteritself passable, yet, how, in defiance of all the laws ofdisposition, came it to beforcedin here? Let the reader turn to the passage, and he will soon perceive, that this could never be theplacefor it. The allegory being concluded, the poet returns to his subject, which is proposed in the six following lines:

Intereà Dryadum sylvas, saltusque sequamurIntactos, tua, Maecenas, haud mollia jussa;Te sine nil altum mens inchoat: en age segnesRumpe moras; vocat ingenti clamore Cithaeron,Taygetique canes, domitrixque Epidaurus equorum,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminata remugit.

Would now any one expect, that the poet, after having conducted the reader, thus respectfully, to the very threshold of his subject, should immediately run away again to the point, from which he had set out, and this on so needless an errand, as the letting him into the secret of his allegory?

But this inserted triplet agrees as ill with whatfollows, as with whatprecedesit. For how abrupt is the transition, and unlike the delicate connexion, so studiously contrived by the Augustan poets, from

Tithoni primâ quot abest ab origine Caesar.

Seu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmae, &c.

When omit but these interpolated lines, and see how gracefully, and by how natural a succession of ideas, the poet slides into the main of his subject.—

Intereà Dryadum silvas saltusque sequamurIntactos—Te sine nil—Rumpe moras: vocat ingenti clamore CithaeronTaygetique canes, domitrixque EpidaurusEQUORUM,Et vox assensu nemorum ingeminataREMUGIT.Seu quis Olympiacae miratus praemia palmaePascitEQUOS;seu quis fortes ad aratraJUVENCOS.

On the whole, I have not the least doubt, that the lines before us are the spurious offspring of somelater poet; if indeed the writer of them deserve that name; for, whoever he was, he is so far from partaking of the original spirit of Virgil, that, at most he appears to have been but a servile and paltry mimic of Ovid; from the opening of whose Metamorphosis the design was clearly taken. The turn of the thought is evidently the same in both, and even the expression.Mutatas dicere formasis echoed byardentes dicere pugnas:dicere fert animus, is, by an affected improvement,accingar dicere: andTithoni primâ ab origineis almost literally the same asprimâque ab origine mundi. For theinsertionof these lines in this place, I leave it to the curious to conjecture of it, as they may: but in the mean time, must esteem the office of the truecriticto be so far resembling that of thepoethimself, as, within some proper limitations, to justify thehonestliberty here taken.

Cum tabulis animum censoris sumet honesti;Audebit quaecunque parum splendoris habebuntEt sine pondere erunt, et honore indigne feruntur,Verba movere loco; quamvis invita recedant,Et versentur adhuc intra penetralia Vestae.[2 Ep. ii. 110.]

38[B. ix. v. 641.]

39Notes on the story of Phaëton.[v. 23.]

40Jacobi Philippi D’ OrvilleAnimadversiones inCharit. Aphrod.lib. iv. c. 4.

41Ibid. vol. ii. p. 325.

42D. L. vol. ii. p. 644.

43At inspiciamus porrò, quid alii,quibus correctius sapit, de hoc loquendi modoCENSUERINT. Agnoscunt enim, etc. p. 299.

44Ibid.

45v. 437.

46Iliad, Γ. 327.

47N. D. ii. 64.

48Pag. 397.

49Inst. Orat.xi. 3.

50There having been such wretches, as the Painter Plutarch speaks of—Χαιρεφάνης, ἀκολάστους ὁμιλίας γυναικῶν πρὸς ἄνδρας. De aud. Poet.

51See an essay on theComposition of the Antients, byJ. Geddes, Esq.

52Sir Philip Sidney.

53Diss. III. vol. ii.

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