Chapter IX: Prologue: TO (1)

THE FIRST SATIRE.

I never did on cleft Parnassus dream,
Nor taste the sacred Heliconian stream;[174]
Nor can remember when my brain, inspired,
Was by the Muses into madness fired.
My share in pale Pyrene[175] I resign,
And claim no part in all the mighty Nine.
Statues, with winding ivy crowned,[176] belong
To nobler poets, for a nobler song;
Heedless of verse, and hopeless of the crown, }
Scarce half a wit, and more than half a clown, }
Before the shrine[177] I lay my rugged numbers down. }
Who taught the parrot human notes to try,
Or with a voice endued the chattering pye?
'Twas witty Want, fierce hunger to appease;
Want taught their masters, and their masters these.
Let gain, that gilded bait, be hung on high,
The hungry witlings have it in their eye;
Pyes, crows, and daws, poetic presents bring;
You say they squeak, but they will swear they sing.

THE

FIRST SATIRE.

IN DIALOGUE BETWIXT

THE POET AND HIS FRIEND, OR MONITOR.

ARGUMENT.

_I need not repeat, that the chief aim of the author is against
bad poets in this Satire. But I must add, that he includes
also bad orators, who began at that time (as Petronius
in the beginning of his book tells us) to enervate manly
eloquence by tropes and figures, ill placed, and worse
applied. Amongst the poets, Persius covertly strikes
at Nero; some of whose verses he recites with scorn and
indignation. He also takes notice of the noblemen, and
their abominable poetry, who, in the luxury of their
fortunes, set up for wits and judges. The Satire is in
dialogue betwixt the author, and his friend, or monitor;
who dissuades him from this dangerous attempt of exposing
great men. But Persius, who is of a free spirit, and has
not forgotten that Rome was once a commonwealth, breaks
through all those difficulties, and boldly arraigns the
false judgment of the age in which he lives. The reader may
observe, that our poet was a Stoic philosopher; and that
all his moral sentences, both here and in all the rest of
his Satires, are drawn from the dogmas of that sect._

PERSIUS.

How anxious are our cares, and yet how vain
The bent of our desires!

FRIEND.

Thy spleen contain;
For none will read thy satires.?

PERSIUS.

This to me?

FRIEND.

None, or, what's next to none, but two or three.
'Tis hard, I grant.

PERSIUS.

'Tis nothing; I can bear,
That paltry scribblers have the public ear;
That this vast universal fool, the town,
Should cry up Labeo's stuff,[178] and cry me down.
They damn themselves; nor will my muse descend
To clap with such, who fools and knaves commend:
Their smiles and censures are to me the same;
I care not what they praise, or what they blame.
In full assemblies let the crowd prevail;
I weigh no merit by the common scale.
The conscience is the test of every mind;
"Seek not thyself, without thyself, to find."
But where's that Roman----Somewhat I would say,
But fear----let fear, for once, to truth give way.
Truth lends the Stoic courage; when I look
On human acts, and read in Nature's book,
From the first pastimes of our infant age,
To elder cares, and man's severer page;
When stern as tutors, and as uncles hard,
We lash the pupil, and defraud the ward,
Then, then I say--or would say, if I durst--
But, thus provoked, I must speak out, or burst.

FRIEND.

Once more forbear.

PERSIUS.

I cannot rule my spleen;
My scorn rebels, and tickles me within.
First, to begin at home:--Our authors write
In lonely rooms, secured from public sight;
Whether in prose, or verse, 'tis all the same,
The prose is fustian, and the numbers lame;
All noise, and empty pomp, a storm of words,
Labouring with sound, that little sense affords.
They comb, and then they order every hair; }
A gown, or white, or scoured to whiteness, wear, }
A birth-day jewel bobbing at their ear;[179] }
Next, gargle well their throats; and, thus prepared,
They mount, a God's name, to be seen and heard;
From their high scaffold, with a trumpet cheek,
And ogling all their audience ere they speak.
The nauseous nobles, even the chief of Rome,
With gaping mouths to these rehearsals come,
And pant with pleasure, when some lusty line
The marrow pierces, and invades the chine;
At open fulsome bawdry they rejoice,
And slimy jests applaud with broken voice.
Base prostitute! thus dost thou gain thy bread?
Thus dost thou feed their ears, and thus art fed?
At his own filthy stuff he grins and brays,
And gives the sign where he expects their praise.
Why have I learned, sayst thou, if thus confined,
I choke the noble vigour of my mind?
Know, my wild fig-tree, which in rocks is bred,
Will split the quarry, and shoot out the head.[180]
Fine fruits of learning! old ambitious fool,
Darest thou apply that adage of the school,
As if 'tis nothing worth that lies concealed,
And "science is not science till revealed?"
Oh, but 'tis brave to be admired, to see
The crowd, with pointing fingers, cry,--That's he;
That's he, whose wonderous poem is become
A lecture for the noble youth of Rome!
Who, by their fathers, is at feasts renowned,
And often quoted when the bowls go round.
Full gorged and flushed, they wantonly rehearse,
And add to wine the luxury of verse.
One, clad in purple, not to lose his time,
Eats and recites some lamentable rhyme;
Some senseless Phillis, in a broken note,
Snuffling at nose, and croaking in his throat.
Then graciously the mellow audience nod;
Is not the immortal author made a god?
Are not his manes blest, such praise to have?
Lies not the turf more lightly on his grave?
And roses (while his loud applause they sing)
Stand ready from his sepulchre to spring?
All these, you cry, but light objections are,
Mere malice, and you drive the jest too far:
For does there breathe a man, who can reject
A general fame, and his own lines neglect?
In cedar tablets[181] worthy to appear, }
That need not fish, or frankincense, to fear? }
Thou, whom I make the adverse part to bear, }
Be answered thus:--If I by chance succeed
In what I write, (and that's a chance indeed,)
Know, I am not so stupid, or so hard,
Not to feel praise, or fame's deserved reward;
But this I cannot grant, that thy applause
Is my work's ultimate, or only cause.
Prudence can ne'er propose so mean a prize;
For mark what vanity within it lies.
Like Labeo's Iliads, in whose verse is found
Nothing but trifling care, and empty sound;
Such little elegies as nobles write,
Who would be poets, in Apollo's spite.
Them and their woeful works the Muse defies;
Products of citron beds,[182] and golden canopies.
To give thee all thy due, thou hast the heart }
To make a supper, with a fine desert, }
And to thy thread-bare friend a cast old suit impart. }
Thus bribed, thou thus bespeak'st him--Tell me, friend,
(For I love truth, nor can plain speech offend,)
What says the world of me and of my muse?
The poor dare nothing tell but flattering news;
But shall I speak? Thy verse is wretched rhyme,
And all thy labours are but loss of time.
Thy strutting belly swells, thy paunch is high;
Thou writ'st not, but thou pissest poetry.
All authors to their own defects are blind;
Hadst thou but, Janus-like,[183] a face behind,
To see the people, what splay-mouths they make;
To mark their fingers, pointed at thy back;
Their tongues lolled out, a foot beyond the pitch,
When most athirst, of an Apulian bitch:
But noble scribblers are with flattery fed,
For none dare find their faults, who eat their bread.
To pass the poets of patrician blood,
What is't the common reader takes for good?
The verse in fashion is, when numbers flow,
Soft without sense, and without spirit slow;
So smooth and equal, that no sight can find
The rivet, where the polished piece was joined;
So even all, with such a steady view,
As if he shut one eye to level true.
Whether the vulgar vice his satire stings,
The people's riots, or the rage of kings,
The gentle poet is alike in all;
His reader hopes no rise, and fears no fall.

FRIEND.

Hourly we see some raw pin-feathered thing
Attempt to mount, and fights and heroes sing;
Who for false quantities was whipt at school
But t'other day, and breaking grammar-rule;
Whose trivial art was never tried above
The bare description of a native grove;
Who knows not how to praise the country store, }
The feasts, the baskets, nor the fatted boar, }
Nor paint the flowery fields that paint themselves before; }
Where Romulus was bred, and Quintius born,[184]
Whose shining plough-share was in furrows worn,
Met by his trembling wife returning home,
And rustically joyed, as chief of Rome:
She wiped the sweat from the Dictator's brow, }
And o'er his back his robe did rudely throw; }
The lictors bore in state their lord's triumphant plough. }
Some love to hear the fustian poet roar,
And some on antiquated authors pore;
Rummage for sense, and think those only good
Who labour most, and least are understood.
When thou shalt see the blear-eyed fathers teach
Their sons this harsh and mouldy sort of speech,
Or others new affected ways to try,
Of wanton smoothness, female poetry;
One would enquire from whence this motley style
Did first our Roman purity defile.
For our old dotards cannot keep their seat,
But leap and catch at all that's obsolete.
Others, by foolish ostentation led,
When called before the bar, to save their head,
Bring trifling tropes, instead of solid sense,
And mind their figures more than their defence;
Are pleased to hear their thick-skulled judges cry,
Well moved, oh finely said, and decently!
Theft (says the accuser) to thy charge I lay,
O Pedius: what does gentle Pedius say?
Studious to please the genius of the times,
With periods, points, and tropes,[185] he slurs his crimes:
"He robbed not, but he borrowed from the poor,
And took but with intention to restore."
He lards with flourishes his long harangue;
'Tis fine, say'st thou;--what, to be praised, and hang?
Effeminate Roman, shall such stuff prevail
To tickle thee, and make thee wag thy tail?
Say, should a shipwrecked sailor sing his woe,
Wouldst thou be moved to pity, or bestow
An alms? What's more preposterous than to see
A merry beggar? Mirth in misery?

PERSIUS.

He seems a trap for charity to lay,
And cons, by night, his lesson for the day.

FRIEND.

But to raw numbers, and unfinished verse,
Sweet sound is added now, to make it terse:
"'Tis tagged with rhyme, like Berecynthian Atys,
The mid-part chimes with art, which never flat is.[186]
The dolphin brave, that cuts the liquid wave,
Or he who in his line can chine the long-ribbed Appennine."

PERSIUS.

All this is doggrel stuff.

FRIEND.

What if I bring
A nobler verse? "Arms and the man I sing."

PERSIUS.

Why name you Virgil with such fops as these?
He's truly great, and must for ever please:
Not fierce, but aweful, is his manly page;
Bold is his strength, but sober is his rage.

FRIEND.

What poems think you soft, and to be read
With languishing regards, and bending head?

PERSIUS.

"Their crooked horns the Mimallonian crew
With blasts inspired;[187] and Bassaris, who slew
The scornful calf, with sword advanced on high,
Made from his neck his haughty head to fly:
And Mænas, when with ivy bridles bound, }
She led the spotted lynx, then Evion rung around; }
Evion from woods and floods repairing echo's sound." }
Could such rude lines a Roman mouth become,
Were any manly greatness left in Rome?
Mænas and Atys[188] in the mouth were bred,
And never hatched within the labouring head;
No blood from bitten nails those poems drew,
But churned, like spittle, from the lips they flew.

FRIEND.

'Tis fustian all; 'tis execrably bad;
But if they will be fools, must you be mad?
Your satires, let me tell you, are too fierce;
The great will never bear so blunt a verse.
Their doors are barred against a bitter flout;
Snarl, if you please, but you shall snarl without.
Expect such pay as railing rhymes deserve;
You're in a very hopeful way to starve.

PERSIUS.

Rather than so, uncensured let them be;
All, all is admirably well, for me.
My harmless rhyme shall 'scape the dire disgrace
Of common-shoars, and every pissing-place.
Two painted serpents[189] shall on high appear;
'Tis holy ground; you must not urine here.
This shall be writ, to fright the fry away,
Who draw their little baubles when they play.
Yet old Lucilius[190] never feared the times,
But lashed the city, and dissected crimes.
Mutius and Lupus both by name he brought;
He mouthed them, and betwixt his grinders caught.
Unlike in method, with concealed design,
Did crafty Horace his low numbers join;
And, with a sly insinuating grace,
Laughed at his friend, and looked him in the face;
Would raise a blush where secret vice he found,
And tickle while he gently probed the wound;
With seeming innocence the crowd beguiled,
But made the desperate passes when he smiled.
Could he do this, and is my muse controuled
By servile awe? Born free, and not be bold?
At least, I'll dig a hole within the ground,
And to the trusty earth commit the sound;
The reeds shall tell you what the poet fears,
"King Midas has a snout, and asses ears."[191]
This mean conceit, this darling mystery,
Which thou think'st nothing, friend, thou shalt not buy;
Nor will I change for all the flashy wit,
That flattering Labeo in his Iliads writ.
Thou, if there be a thou in this base town,
Who dares, with angry Eupolis, to frown;
He who, with bold Cratinus, is inspired
With zeal,[192] and equal indignation fired;
Who at enormous villainy turns pale,
And steers against it with a full-blown sail,
Like Aristophanes, let him but smile
On this my honest work, though writ in homely style;
And if two lines or three in all the vein
Appear less drossy, read those lines again.
May they perform their author's just intent,
Glow in thy ears, and in thy breast ferment!
But from the reading of my book and me,
Be far, ye foes of virtuous poverty;
Who fortune's fault upon the poor can throw,[193]
Point at the tattered coat, and ragged shoe;
Lay nature's failings to their charge, and jeer
The dim weak eye-sight when the mind is clear;
When thou thyself, thus insolent in state,
Art but, perhaps, some country magistrate,
Whose power extends no farther than to speak
Big on the bench, and scanty weights to break.
Him also for my censor I disdain,
Who thinks all science, as all virtue, vain;
Who counts geometry, and numbers toys,
And with his foot the sacred dust destroys;[194]
Whose pleasure is to see a strumpet tear
A cynick's beard, and lug him by the hair.
Such all the morning to the pleadings run; }
But when the business of the day is done, }
On dice, and drink, and drabs, they spend their afternoon. }

FOOTNOTES:

[174] Parnassus and Helicon were hills consecrated to the Muses, and the supposed place of their abode. Parnassus was forked on the top; and from Helicon ran a stream, the spring of which was called the Muses' well.

[175] Pyrene, a fountain in Corinth, consecrated also to the Muses.

[176] The statues of the poets were crowned with ivy about their brows.

[177] Before the shrine; that is, before the shrine of Apollo, in his temple at Rome, called the Palatine.

[178] Note I.

[179] Note II.

[180] Note III.

[181] Note IV.

[182] Note V.

[183] Note VI.

[184] Note VII.

[185] Note VIII.

[186] Note IX.

[187] Note X.

[188] Note XI.

[189] Note XII.

[190] Note XIII.

[191] Note XIV.

[192] Note XV.

[193] Note XVI.

[194] Note XVII.

NOTES

ON

TRANSLATIONS FROM PERSIUS.

SATIRE I.

Note I.

_Should cry up Labeo's stuff, and cry me down._--P. 208.

Nothing is remaining of Atticus Labeo (so he is called by the learned Casaubon); nor is he mentioned by any other poet, besides Persius. Casaubon, from an old commentator on Persius, says, that he made a very foolish translation of Homer's Iliads.

Note II.

_They comb, and then they order every hair;
A gown, or white, or scoured to whiteness, wear;
A birth-day jewel bobbing at their ear._--P. 209.

He describes a poet, preparing himself to rehearse his works in public, which was commonly performed in August. A room was hired, or lent, by some friend; a scaffold was raised, and a pulpit placed for him who was to hold forth; who borrowed a new gown, or scoured his old one, and adorned his ears with jewels, &c.

Note III.

_Know, my wild fig-tree, which in rocks is bred,
Will split the quarry, and shoot out the head._--P. 209.

Trees of that kind grow wild in many parts of Italy, and make their way through rocks, sometimes splitting the tomb-stones.

Note IV.

_In cedar tablets worthy to appear._--P. 210.

The Romans wrote on cedar and cypress tables, in regard of the duration of the wood. Ill verses might justly be afraid of frankincense; for the papers in which they were written, were fit for nothing but to wrap it up.

Note V.

_Products of citron beds._--P. 210.

Writings of noblemen, whose bedsteads were of the wood of citron.

Note VI.

_Hadst thou but, Janus-like, a face behind._--P. 211.

Janus was the first king of Italy, who refuged Saturn when he was expelled, by his son Jupiter, from Crete (or, as we now call it, Candia). From his name the first month of the year is called January. He was pictured with two faces, one before and one behind; as regarding the past time and the future. Some of the mythologists think he was Noah, for the reason given above.

Note VII.

_Where Romulus was bred, and Quintius born._--P. 212.

He speaks of the country in the foregoing verses; the praises of which are the most easy theme for poets, but which a bad poet cannot naturally describe: then he makes a digression to Romulus, the first king of Rome, who had a rustical education; and enlarges upon Quintius Cincinnatus, a Roman senator, who was called from the plough to be dictator of Rome.

Note VIII.

_With periods, points, and tropes, he slurs his crimes._ P. 213.

Persius here names antitheses, or seeming contradictions; which, in this place, are meant for rhetorical flourishes, as I think, with Casaubon.

Note IX.

_'Tis tagged with rhyme, like Berecynthian Atys,
The mid-part chimes with art, which never flat is._ P. 213.

Foolish verses of Nero, which the poet repeats; and which cannot be translated, properly, into English.

Note X.

_Their crooked horns the Mimallonian crew
With blasts inspired._--P. 214.

Other verses of Nero, that were mere bombast. I only note, that the repetition of these and the former verses of Nero, might justly give the poet a caution to conceal his name.

Note XI.

_Mænas and Atys._--P. 214.

Poems on the Mænades, who were priestesses of Bacchus; and of Atys, who made himself an eunuch to attend on the sacrifices of Cybele, called Berecynthia by the poets. She was mother of the gods.

Note XII.

_Two painted serpents shall on high appear._--P. 215.

Two snakes, twined with each other, were painted on the walls, by the ancients, to show the place was holy.

Note XIII.

_Old Lucilius._--P. 215.

Lucilius wrote long before Horace, who imitates his manner of satire, but far excels him in the design.

Note XIV.

_King Midas has a snout, and asses ears._--P. 215.

The story is vulgar, that Midas, king of Phrygia, was made judge betwixt Apollo and Pan, who was the best musician: he gave the prize to Pan; and Apollo, in revenge, gave him asses ears. He wore his hair long to hide them; but his barber discovering them, and not daring to divulge the secret, dug a hole in the ground, and whispered into it: the place was marshy; and, when the reeds grew up, they repeated the words which were spoken by the barber. By Midas, the poet meant Nero.

Note XV.

_Who dares, with angry Eupolis, to frown;
He who, with bold Cratinus, is inspired
With zeal._--P. 215.

Eupolis and Cratinus, as also Aristophanes, mentioned afterwards, were all Athenian poets; who wrote that sort of comedy which was called the Old Comedy, where the people were named who were satirized by those authors.

Note XVI.

_Who fortune's fault upon the poor can throw._--P. 216.

The people of Rome, in the time of Persius, were apt to scorn the Grecian philosophers, particularly the Cynics and Stoics, who were the poorest of them.

Note XVII.

_Who counts geometry, and numbers toys,
And with his foot the sacred dust destroys._--P. 216.

Arithmetic and geometry were taught on floors, which were strewed with dust, or sand; in which the numbers and diagrams were made and drawn, which they might strike out at pleasure.

THE

SECOND SATIRE

OF

PERSIUS.

DEDICATED TO HIS FRIEND

PLOTIUS MACRINUS,

ON HIS BIRTH-DAY.

THE ARGUMENT.

_This Satire contains a most grave and philosophical argument,
concerning prayers and wishes. Undoubtedly it gave
occasion to Juvenal's tenth satire; and both of them had
their original from one of Plato's dialogues, called the
"Second Alcibiades." Our author has induced it with great
mystery of art, by taking his rise from the birth-day of
his friend; on which occasions, prayers were made, and
sacrifices offered by the native. Persius, commending,
first, the purity of his friend's vows, descends to the
impious and immoral requests of others. The satire is
divided into three parts. The first is the exordium to
Macrinus, which the poet confines within the compass of
four verses: the second relates to the matter of the prayers
and vows, and an enumeration of those things, wherein
men commonly sinned against right reason, and offended
in their requests: the third part consists in showing
the repugnances of those prayers and wishes, to those of
other men, and inconsistencies with themselves. He shows
the original of these vows, and sharply inveighs against
them; and, lastly, not only corrects the false opinion of
mankind concerning them, but gives the true doctrine of
all addresses made to heaven, and how they may be made
acceptable to the powers above, in excellent precepts, and
more worthy of a Christian than a Heathen._

Let this auspicious morning be exprest
With a white stone,[195] distinguished from the rest,
White as thy fame, and as thy honour clear,
And let new joys attend on thy new added year.
Indulge thy genius, and o'erflow thy soul,
Till thy wit sparkle, like the cheerful bowl.
Pray; for thy prayers the test of heaven will bear,
Nor need'st thou take the gods aside to hear;
While others, even the mighty men of Rome,
Big swelled with mischief, to the temples come,
And in low murmurs, and with costly smoke,
Heaven's help to prosper their black vows, invoke:
So boldly to the gods mankind reveal
What from each other they, for shame, conceal.
Give me good fame, ye powers, and make me just;
Thus much the rogue to public ears will trust:
In private then,--When wilt thou, mighty Jove;
My wealthy uncle from this world remove?
Or, O thou Thunderer's son, great Hercules,
That once thy bounteous deity would please
To guide my rake upon the chinking sound
Of some vast treasure, hidden under ground![196]
O were my pupil fairly knocked o' the head,
I should possess the estate if he were dead!
He's so far gone with rickets, and with the evil,
That one small dose would send him to the devil.
This is my neighbour Nerius his third spouse,
Of whom in happy time he rids his house;
But my eternal wife!--Grant, heaven, I may
Survive to see the fellow of this day!
Thus, that thou may'st the better bring about
Thy wishes, thou art wickedly devout;
In Tyber ducking thrice, by break of day,
To wash the obscenities of night away.[197]
But, pr'ythee, tell me, ('tis a small request,)
With what ill thoughts of Jove art thou possest?
Wouldst thou prefer him to some man? Suppose
I dipped among the worst, and Staius chose?
Which of the two would thy wise head declare
The trustier tutor to an orphan heir?
Or, put it thus:--Unfold to Staius, straight,
What to Jove's ear thou didst impart of late:
He'll stare, and O, good Jupiter! will cry,
Canst thou indulge him in this villainy?
And think'st thou Jove himself with patience then
Can hear a prayer condemned by wicked men?
That, void of care, he lolls supine in state,
And leaves his business to be done by fate,
Because his thunder splits some burly tree,
And is not darted at thy house and thee;
Or that his vengeance falls not at the time,
Just at the perpetration of thy crime,
And makes thee a sad object of our eyes,
Fit for Ergenna's prayer and sacrifice?[198]
What well-fed offering to appease the God,
What powerful present to procure a nod,
Hast thou in store? What bribe hast thou prepared,
To pull him, thus unpunished, by the beard?
Our superstitions with our life begin;[199]
The obscene old grandam, or the next of kin,
The new-born infant from the cradle takes,
And, first, of spittle a lustration makes;
Then in the spawl her middle-finger dips,
Anoints the temples, forehead, and the lips,
Pretending force of magic to prevent,
By virtue of her nasty excrement;
Then dandles him with many a muttered prayer,
That heaven would make him some rich miser's heir,
Lucky to ladies, and in time a king;
Which to ensure, she adds a length of navel-string.
But no fond nurse is fit to make a prayer,
And Jove, if Jove be wise, will never hear;
Not though she prays in white, with lifted hands.
A body made of brass the crone demands
For her loved nursling, strung with nerves of wire,
Tough to the last, and with no toil to tire;
Unconscionable vows, which, when we use,
We teach the gods, in reason, to refuse.
Suppose they were indulgent to thy wish,
Yet the fat entrails in the spacious dish
Would stop the grant; the very over-care
And nauseous pomp, would hinder half the prayer.
Thou hop'st with sacrifice of oxen slain
To compass wealth, and bribe the god of gain
To give thee flocks and herds, with large increase;
Fool! to expect them from a bullock's grease!
And think'st that when the fattened flames aspire,
Thou see'st the accomplishment of thy desire!
Now, now, my bearded harvest gilds the plain, }
The scanty folds can scarce my sheep contain, }
And showers of gold come pouring in amain! }
Thus dreams the wretch, and vainly thus dreams on,
Till his lank purse declares his money gone.
Should I present them with rare figured plate,
Or gold as rich in workmanship as weight;
O how thy rising heart would throb and beat,
And thy left side, with trembling pleasure, sweat!
Thou measur'st by thyself the powers divine;
Thy gods are burnished gold, and silver is their shrine.
The puny godlings of inferior race,
Whose humble statues are content with brass,
Should some of these, in visions purged from phlegm,
Foretel events, or in a morning dream;[200]
Even those thou would'st in veneration hold,
And, if not faces, give them beards of gold.
The priests in temples now no longer care
For Saturn's brass,[201] or Numa's earthen ware;[202]
Or vestal urns, in each religious rite;
This wicked gold has put them all to flight.
O souls, in whom no heavenly fire is found,
Fat minds, and ever grovelling on the ground!
We bring our manners to the blest abodes,
And think what pleases us must please the gods.
Of oil and cassia one the ingredients takes,
And, of the mixture, a rich ointment makes;
Another finds the way to dye in grain,
And makes Calabrian wool[203] receive the Tyrian stain;
Or from the shells their orient treasure takes,
Or for their golden ore in rivers rakes,
Then melts the mass. All these are vanities,
Yet still some profit from their pains may rise:
But tell me, priest, if I may be so bold,
What are the gods the better for this gold?
The wretch, that offers from his wealthy store
These presents, bribes the powers to give him more;
As maids to Venus offer baby-toys,[204]
To bless the marriage-bed with girls and boys.
But let us for the gods a gift prepare,
Which the great man's great chargers cannot bear;
A soul, where laws, both human and divine,
In practice more than speculation shine;
A genuine virtue, of a vigorous kind,
Pure in the last recesses of the mind:
When with such offerings to the gods I come,
A cake, thus given, is worth a hecatomb.[205]

FOOTNOTES:

[195] Note I.

[196] Note II.

[197] Note III.

[198] Note IV.

[199] Note V.

[200] Note VI.

[201] Note VII.

[202] Note VIII.

[203] Note IX.

[204] Note X.

[205] Note XI.

NOTES

ON

TRANSLATIONS FROM PERSIUS.

SATIRE II.

Note I.

_Let this auspicious morning be exprest
With a white stone._----P. 222.

The Romans were used to mark their fortunate days, or any thing that luckily befel them, with a white stone, which they had from the island Creta, and their unfortunate with a coal.

Note II.

----_Great Hercules,
That once thy bounteous deity would please
To guide my rake upon the chinking sound
Of some vast treasure, hidden under ground._--P. 222.

Hercules was thought to have the key and power of bestowing all hidden treasure.

Note III.

_In Tyber ducking thrice, by break of day,
To wash the obscenities of night away._--P. 223.

The ancients thought themselves tainted and polluted by night itself, as well as bad dreams in the night; and therefore purified themselves by washing their heads and hands every morning, which custom the Turks observe to this day.

Note IV.

_Fit for Ergenna's prayer and sacrifice_.--P. 223.

When any one was thunderstruck, the soothsayer (who is here called Ergenna) immediately repaired to the place, to expiate the displeasure of the gods, by sacrificing two sheep.

Note V.

_Our superstitions with our life begin_.--P. 223.

The poet laughs at the superstitious ceremonies which the old women made use of in their lustration, or purification days, when they named their children, which was done on the eighth day to females, and on the ninth to males.

Note VI.

_Should some of these, in visions purged from phlegm,
Foretel events, or in a morning dream._--P. 225.

It was the opinion both of Grecians and Romans, that the gods, in visions and dreams, often revealed to their favourites a cure for their diseases, and sometimes those of others. Thus Alexander dreamed of an herb which cured Ptolemy. These gods were principally Apollo and Esculapius; but, in aftertimes, the same virtue and good-will was attributed to Isis and Osiris. Which brings to my remembrance an odd passage in Sir Thomas Brown's Religio Medici, or in his Vulgar Errors; the sense whereof is, that we are beholden, for many of our discoveries in physic, to the courteous revelation of spirits. By the expression, of "visions purged from phlegm," our author means such dreams or visions as proceed not from natural causes, or humours of the body, but such as are sent from heaven; and are, therefore, certain remedies.

Note VII.

_The priests in temples, now no longer care
For Saturn's brass._--P. 225.

Brazen vessels, in which the public treasures of the Romans were kept: it may be the poet means only old vessels, which were called #Kronia#, from the Greek name of Saturn. Note also, that the Roman treasury was in the temple of Saturn.

Note VIII.

----_Or Numa's earthen ware._--P. 225.

Under Numa, the second king of Rome, and for a long time after him, the holy vessels for sacrifice were of earthen-ware; according to the superstitious rites which were introduced by the same Numa: though afterwards, when Memmius had taken Corinth, and Paulus Emilius had conquered Macedonia, luxury began amongst the Romans, and then their utensils of devotion were of gold and silver, &c.

Note IX.

_And makes Calabrian wool, &c._--P. 225.

The wool of Calabria was of the finest sort in Italy, as Juvenal also tells us. The Tyrian stain is the purple colour dyed at Tyrus; and I suppose, but dare not positively affirm, that the richest of that dye was nearest our crimson, and not scarlet, or that other colour more approaching to the blue. I have not room to justify my conjecture.

Note X.

_As maids to Venus offer baby-toys._--P. 225.

Those baby-toys were little babies, or poppets, as we call them; in Latin, pupæ; which the girls, when they came to the age of puberty, or child bearing, offered to Venus; as the boys, at fourteen or fifteen, offered their _bullæ_, or bosses.

Note XI.

_A cake, thus given, is worth a hecatomb._--P. 226.

A cake of barley, or coarse wheat-meal, with the bran in it. The meaning is, that God is pleased with the pure and spotless heart of the offerer, and not with the riches of the offering. Laberius, in the fragments of his "Mimes," has a verse like this--_Puras, Deus, non plenas aspicit manus_.--What I had forgotten before, in its due place, I must here tell the reader, that the first half of this satire was translated by one of my sons, now in Italy; but I thought so well of it, that I let it pass without any alteration.

THE

THIRD SATIRE

OF

PERSIUS.

THE ARGUMENT.

_Our author has made two Satires concerning study, the first
and the third: the first related to men; this to young
students, whom he desired to be educated in the Stoic
philosophy. He himself sustains the person of the master,
or preceptor, in this admirable Satire, where he upbraids
the youth of sloth, and negligence in learning. Yet he
begins with one scholar reproaching his fellow-students
with late rising to their books. After which, he takes
upon him the other part of the teacher; and, addressing
himself particularly to young noblemen, tells them, that,
by reason of their high birth, and the great possessions
of their fathers, they are careless of adorning their
minds with precepts of moral philosophy: and, withal,
inculcates to them the miseries which will attend them
in the whole course of their life, if they do not apply
themselves betimes to the knowledge of virtue, and the end
of their creation, which he pathetically insinuates to them.
The title of this satire, in some ancient manuscripts,
was, "the Reproach of Idleness;" though in others of the
scholiasts it is inscribed, "Against the Luxury and Vices
of the Rich." In both of which, the intention of the poet
is pursued, but principally in the former._

[I remember I translated this satire when I was a king's
scholar at Westminster school, for a Thursday-night's
exercise; and believe, that it, and many other of my
exercises of this nature in English verse, are still in the
hands of my learned master, the Rev. Dr Busby.]

Is this thy daily course? The glaring sun }
Breaks in at every chink; the cattle run }
To shades, and noon-tide rays of summer shun; }
Yet plunged in sloth we lie, and snore supine,
As filled with fumes of undigested wine.
This grave advice some sober student bears,
And loudly rings it in his fellow's ears.
The yawning youth, scarce half awake, essays
His lazy limbs and dozy head to raise;
Then rubs his gummy eyes, and scrubs his pate,
And cries,--I thought it had not been so late!
My clothes, make haste!--why then, if none be near,
He mutters, first, and then begins to swear;
And brays aloud, with a more clamorous note,
Than an Arcadian ass can stretch his throat.
With much ado, his book before him laid,
And parchment with the smoother side displayed,[206]
He takes the papers; lays them down again,
And with unwilling fingers tries the pen.
Some peevish quarrel straight he strives to pick,
His quill writes double, or his ink's too thick;
Infuse more water,--now 'tis grown so thin,
It sinks, nor can the characters be seen.
O wretch, and still more wretched every day!
Are mortals born to sleep their lives away?
Go back to what thy infancy began,
Thou, who wert never meant to be a man;
Eat pap and spoon-meat, for thy gewgaws cry;
Be sullen, and refuse the lullaby.
No more accuse thy pen; but charge the crime
On native sloth, and negligence of time.
Think'st thou thy master, or thy friends, to cheat?
Fool, 'tis thyself, and that's a worse deceit.
Beware the public laughter of the town;
Thou spring'st a leak already in thy crown;
A flaw is in thy ill-baked vessel found;
'Tis hollow, and returns a jarring sound.
Yet thy moist clay is pliant to command,
Unwrought, and easy to the potter's hand:
Now take the mould; now bend thy mind to feel
The first sharp motions of the forming wheel.
But thou hast land; a country seat, secure
By a just title; costly furniture;
A fuming pan thy Lares to appease:[207]
What need of learning when a man's at ease?
If this be not enough to swell thy soul,
Then please thy pride, and search the herald's roll,
Where thou shalt find thy famous pedigree }
Drawn from the root of some old Tuscan tree,[208] }
And thou, a thousand off, a fool of long degree; }
Who, clad in purple, can'st thy censor greet,[209]
And loudly call him cousin in the street.
Such pageantry be to the people shown:
There boast thy horse's trappings, and thy own.
I know thee to thy bottom, from within
Thy shallow centre, to the utmost skin:
Dost thou not blush to live so like a beast,
So trim, so dissolute, so loosely drest?
But 'tis in vain; the wretch is drenched too deep,
His soul is stupid, and his heart asleep;
Fattened in vice, so callous, and so gross,
He sins, and sees not, senseless of his loss.
Down goes the wretch at once, unskilled to swim,
Hopeless to bubble up, and reach the water's brim.
Great father of the gods, when for our crimes
Thou send'st some heavy judgment on the times;
Some tyrant-king, the terror of his age,
The type, and true vicegerent of thy rage;
Thus punish him: set virtue in his sight,
With all her charms, adorned with all her graces bright;
But set her distant, make him pale to see
His gains outweighed by lost felicity!
Sicilian tortures, and the brazen bull,[210]
Are emblems, rather than express the full
Of what he feels; yet what he fears is more:
The wretch, who, sitting at his plenteous board,
Looked up, and viewed on high the pointed sword
Hang o'er his head, and hanging by a twine,
Did with less dread, and more securely dine.[211]
Even in his sleep he starts, and fears the knife,
And, trembling, in his arms takes his accomplice wife;
Down, down he goes; and from his darling friend
Conceals the woes his guilty dreams portend.
When I was young, I, like a lazy fool,
Would blear my eyes with oil, to stay from school:
Averse from pains, and loth to learn the part
Of Cato, dying with a dauntless heart;
Though much my master that stern virtue praised,
Which o'er the vanquisher the vanquished raised;
And my pleased father came with pride to see
His boy defend the Roman liberty.
But then my study was to cog the dice,
And dexterously to throw the lucky sice;
To shun ames-ace, that swept my stakes away, }
And watch the box, for fear they should convey }
False bones, and put upon me in the play; }
Careful, besides, the whirling top to whip,
And drive her giddy, till she fell asleep.
Thy years are ripe, nor art thou yet to learn
What's good or ill, and both their ends discern:
Thou in the Stoic-porch,[212] severely bred,
Hast heard the dogmas of great Zeno read;
Where on the walls, by Polygnotus' hand,
The conquered Medians in trunk-breeches stand;[213]
Where the shorn youth to midnight lectures rise,
Roused from their slumbers to be early wise;
Where the coarse cake, and homely husks of beans,
From pampering riot the young stomach weans;
And where the Samian Y directs thy steps to run
To Virtue's narrow steep, and broad-way Vice to shun.[214]
And yet thou snor'st, thou draw'st thy drunken breath,
Sour with debauch, and sleep'st the sleep of death:
Thy chaps are fallen, and thy frame disjoined;
Thy body is dissolved as is thy mind.
Hast thou not yet proposed some certain end,
To which thy life, thy every act, may tend?
Hast thou no mark, at which to bend thy bow?
Or, like a boy, pursuest the carrion crow
With pellets, and with stones, from tree to tree,
A fruitless toil, and livest _extempore_?
Watch the disease in time; for when within
The dropsy rages, and extends the skin,
In vain for hellebore the patient cries,
And fees the doctor, but too late is wise;
Too late, for cure he proffers half his wealth;
Conquest and Guibbons[215] cannot give him health.
Learn, wretches, learn the motions of the mind, }
Why you were made, for what you were designed, }
And the great moral end of human kind. }
Study thyself, what rank, or what degree,
The wise Creator has ordained for thee;
And all the offices of that estate
Perform, and with thy prudence guide thy fate.
Pray justly to be heard, nor more desire
Than what the decencies of life require.
Learn what thou owest thy country, and thy friend;
What's requisite to spare, and what to spend:
Learn this; and after, envy not the store
Of the greased advocate, that grinds the poor;
Fat fees[216] from the defended Umbrian draws,
And only gains the wealthy client's cause;
To whom the Marsians more provision send,
Than he and all his family can spend.
Gammons, that give a relish to the taste,
And potted fowl, and fish come in so fast,
That ere the first is out, the second stinks,
And mouldy mother gathers on the brinks.
But here some captain of the land, or fleet,
Stout of his hands, but of a soldier's wit,
Cries,--I have sense to serve my turn in store,
And he's a rascal who pretends to more.
Damn me, whate'er those book-learned blockheads say,
Solon's the veriest fool in all the play.
Top-heavy drones, and always looking down,
(As over ballasted within the crown,)
Muttering betwixt their lips some mystic thing,
Which, well examined, is flat conjuring;
Mere madmen's dreams; for what the schools have taught, }
Is only this, that nothing can be brought }
From nothing, and what is can ne'er be turned to nought. }
Is it for this they study? to grow pale,
And miss the pleasures of a glorious meal?
For this, in rags accoutered, are they seen,
And made the may-game of the public spleen?--
Proceed, my friend, and rail; but hear me tell
A story, which is just thy parallel:--
A spark, like thee, of the man-killing trade,
Fell sick, and thus to his physician said,--
Methinks I am not right in every part;
I feel a kind of trembling at my heart,
My pulse unequal, and my breath is strong,
Besides a filthy fur upon my tongue.
The doctor heard him, exercised his skill,
And after bade him for four days be still.
Three days he took good counsel, and began
To mend, and look like a recovering man;
The fourth he could not hold from drink, but sends
His boy to one of his old trusty friends,
Adjuring him, by all the powers divine, }
To pity his distress, who could not dine }
Without a flaggon of his healing wine. }
He drinks a swilling draught; and, lined within,
Will supple in the bath his outward skin:
Whom should he find but his physician there,
Who wisely bade him once again beware.
Sir, you look wan, you hardly draw your breath;
Drinking is dangerous, and the bath is death.
'Tis nothing, says the fool; but, says the friend,
This nothing, sir, will bring you to your end.
Do I not see your dropsy belly swell?
Your yellow skin?--No more of that; I'm well.
I have already buried two or three }
That stood betwixt a fair estate and me, }
And, doctor, I may live to bury thee. }
Thou tell'st me, I look ill; and thou look'st worse.
I've done, says the physician; take your course.
The laughing sot, like all unthinking men,
Bathes, and gets drunk; then bathes, and drinks again:
His throat half throttled with corrupted phlegm,
And breathing through his jaws a belching steam,
Amidst his cups with fainting shivering seized,
His limbs disjointed, and all o'er diseased,
His hand refuses to sustain the bowl, }
And his teeth chatter, and his eye-balls roll, }
Till with his meat he vomits out his soul; }
Then trumpets, torches, and a tedious crew
Of hireling mourners, for his funeral due.
Our dear departed brother lies in state, }
His heels stretched out, and pointing to the gate;[217] }
And slaves, now manumized, on their dead master wait. }
They hoist him on the bier, and deal the dole,
And there's an end of a luxurious fool.
But what's thy fulsome parable to me?
My body is from all diseases free;
My temperate pulse does regularly beat; }
Feel, and be satisfied, my hands and feet: }
These are not cold, nor those opprest with heat. }
Or lay thy hand upon my naked heart,
And thou shalt find me hale in every part.
I grant this true; but still the deadly wound
Is in thy soul, 'tis there thou art not sound.
Say, when thou see'st a heap of tempting gold,
Or a more tempting harlot dost behold;
Then, when she casts on thee a side-long glance,
Then try thy heart, and tell me if it dance.
Some coarse cold sallad is before thee set; }
Bread with the bran, perhaps, and broken meat; }
Fall on, and try thy appetite to eat. }
These are not dishes for thy dainty tooth:
What, hast thou got an ulcer in thy mouth?
Why stand'st thou picking? Is thy palate sore,
That bete and radishes will make thee roar?
Such is the unequal temper of thy mind,
Thy passions in extremes, and unconfined;
Thy hair so bristles with unmanly fears,
As fields of corn, that rise in bearded ears;
And when thy cheeks with flushing fury glow, }
The rage of boiling cauldrons is more slow, }
When fed with fuel and with flames below. }
With foam upon thy lips and sparkling eyes,
Thou say'st, and dost, in such outrageous wise,
That mad Orestes,[218] if he saw the show,
Would swear thou wert the madder of the two.

FOOTNOTES:

[206] Note I.

[207] Note II.

[208] Note III.

[209] Note IV.

[210] Note V.

[211] Note VI.

[212] Note VII.

[213] Note VIII.

[214] Note IX.

[215] Two learned physicians of the period. Dryden mentions Guibbons more than once, as a friend.

[216] Note X.

[217] Note XI.

[218] Note XII.

NOTES

ON

TRANSLATIONS FROM PERSIUS.

SATIRE III.

Note I.

_And parchment with the smoother side displayed._--P. 231.

The students used to write their notes on parchments; the inside, on which they wrote, was white; the other side was hairy, and commonly yellow. Quintilian reproves this custom, and advises rather table-books, lined with wax, and a stile, like that we use in our vellum table-books, as more easy.

Note II.

_A fuming-pan thy Lares to appease._--P. 232.

Before eating, it was customary to cut off some part of the meat, which was first put into a pan, or little dish, then into the fire, as an offering to the household gods: this they called a Libation.

Note III.

_Drawn from the root of some old Tuscan tree._--P. 232.

The Tuscans were accounted of most ancient nobility. Horace observes this in most of his compliments to Mæcenas, who was derived from the old kings of Tuscany; now the dominion of the Great Duke.

Note IV.

_Who, clad in purple, canst thy censor greet._--P. 232.

The Roman knights, attired in the robe called _trabea_, were summoned by the censor to appear before him, and to salute him in passing by, as their names were called over. They led their horses in their hand. See more of this in Pompey's Life, written by Plutarch.

Note V.

_Sicilian tortures, and the brazen bull._--P. 233.

Some of the Sicilian kings were so great tyrants, that the name is become proverbial. The brazen bull is a known story of Phalaris, one of those tyrants, who, when Perillus, a famous artist, had presented him with a bull of that metal hollowed within, which, when the condemned person was inclosed in it, would render the sound of a bull's roaring, caused the workman to make the first experiment,--_docuitque suum mugire juvencum_.

Note VI.

_The wretch, who, sitting at his plenteous board,
Looked up, and viewed on high the pointed sword._--P. 233.

He alludes to the story of Damocles, a flatterer of one of those Sicilian tyrants, namely Dionysius. Damocles had infinitely extolled the happiness of kings: Dionysius, to convince him of the contrary, invited him to a feast, and clothed him in purple; but caused a sword, with the point downward, to be hung over his head by a silken twine; which, when he perceived, he could eat nothing of the delicates that were set before him.

Note VII.

_Thou in the Stoic-porch, severely bred._--P. 233.

The Stoics taught their philosophy under a porticus, to secure their scholars from the weather. Zeno was the chief of that sect.

Note VIII.

_Where on the walls, by Polygnotus' hand,
The conquered Medians in trunk-breeches stand._--P. 233.

Polygnotus, a famous painter, who drew the pictures of the Medes and Persians, conquered by Miltiades, Themistocles, and other Athenian captains, on the walls of the portico, in their natural habits.

Note IX.

_And where the Samian Y directs thy steps to run
To Virtue's narrow steep, and broad-way Vice to shun._ P. 234.

Pythagoras, of Samos, made the allusion of the Y, or Greek _upsilon_, to Vice and Virtue. One side of the letter being broad, characters Vice, to which the ascent is wide and easy; the other side represents Virtue, to which the passage is strait and difficult; and perhaps our Saviour might also allude to this, in those noted words of the evangelist, "The way to heaven," &c.

Note X.

_Fat fees from the defended Umbrian draws._--P. 235.

Casaubon here notes, that, among all the Romans, who were brought up to learning, few, besides the orators or lawyers, grew rich.

Note XI.

_His heels stretched out, and pointing to the gate._ P. 237.

The Romans were buried without the city; for which reason, the poet says, that the dead man's heels were stretched out towards the gate.

Note XII.

----_Mad Orestes._--P. 238.

Orestes was son to Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. Agamemnon, at his return from the Trojan wars, was slain by Ægysthus, the adulterer of Clytemnestra. Orestes, to revenge his father's death, slew both Ægysthus and his mother; for which he was punished with madness by the Eumenides, or Furies, who continually haunted him.

THE

FOURTH SATIRE

OF

PERSIUS.

THE ARGUMENT.

_Our author, living in the time of Nero, was contemporary
and friend to the noble poet Lucan. Both of them were
sufficiently sensible, with all good men, how unskilfully
he managed the commonwealth; and perhaps might guess at
his future tyranny, by some passages, during the latter
part of his first five years; though he broke not out into
his great excesses, while he was restrained by the counsels
and authority of Seneca. Lucan has not spared him in the
poem of his Pharsalia; for his very compliment looked
asquint, as well as Nero.[219] Persius has been bolder,
but with caution likewise. For here, in the person of
young Alcibiades, he arraigns his ambition of meddling
with state-affairs without judgment, or experience. It is
probable, that he makes Seneca, in this satire, sustain
the part of Socrates, under a borrowed name; and, withal,
discovers some secret vices of Nero, concerning his lust,
his drunkenness, find his effeminacy, which had not yet
arrived to public notice. He also reprehends the flattery
of his courtiers, who endeavoured to make all his vices
pass for virtues. Covetousness was undoubtedly none of his
faults; but it is here described as a veil cast over the true
meaning of the poet, which was to satirize his prodigality
and voluptuousness; to which he makes a transition. I find
no instance in history of that emperor's being a Pathic,
though Persius seems to brand him with it. From the two
dialogues of Plato, both called "Alcibiades," the poet
took the arguments of the second and third satires; but he
inverted the order of them, for the third satire is taken
from the first of those dialogues._