A History of Roman Literature by Charles Thomas Cruttwell
C >>
Charles Thomas Cruttwell >> A History of Roman Literature
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19 |
20 | 21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
25 |
26 |
27 |
28 |
29 |
30 |
31 |
32 |
33 |
34 |
35 |
36 |
37 |
38 |
39 |
40 |
41 |
42 |
43 |
44 |
45 |
46 |
47 |
48 |
49 |
50 |
51 |
52
This being the lamentable state of things, we are surprised to find that
Mime writing was practised by two men of vigorous talent and philosophic
culture, whose fragments, so far from betraying any concession to the
prevailing depravity, are above the ordinary tone of ancient comic
morality. They are the knight D. LABERIUS (106-43 B.C.) and PUBLILIUS
SYRUS (fl. 44 B.C.), an enfranchised Syrian slave. It is probable that
Caesar lent his countenance to these writers in the hope of raising their
art. His patronage was valuable; but he put a great indignity (45 B.C.) on
Laberius. The old man, for he was then sixty years of age, had written
Mimes for a generation, but had never acted in them himself. Caesar, whom
he may have offended by indiscreet allusions, [8] recommended him to
appear in person against his rival Syrus. This recommendation, as he well
knew, was equivalent to a command. In the prologue he expresses his sense
of the affront with great manliness and force of language. We quote some
lines from it, as a specimen of the best plebeian Latin;
"Necessitas, cuius cursus, transversi impetum
Voluerunt multi effugere, pauci potuerunt,
Quo me detrusit paene extremis sensibus?
Quem nulla ambitio, nulla unquam largitio,
Nullus timor, vis nulla, nulla auctoritas
Movere potuit in inventa de statu,
Ecce in senecta ut facile labefecit loco
Viri excellentis mente clemente edita
Summissa placide blandiloquens oratio!
Et enim ipsi di negare cui nil potuerunt,
Hominem me denegare quis posset pati?
Ego bis tricenis actis annis sine nota,
Eques Romanus e lare egressus meo,
Domum revertormimus--ni mirum hoc die
Uno plus vixi mihi quam vivendum fuit.
* * * * *
Porro, Quirites, libertatem perdimus." [9]
In these noble lines we see the native eloquence of a free spirit. But the
poet's wrathful muse roused itself in vain. Caesar awarded the prize to
Syrus, saying to Laberius in an impromptu verse of polite condescension,
"Favente tibime victus, Laberi, es a Syro." [10]
From this time the old knight surrendered the stage to his younger and
more polished rival.
Syrus vas a native of Antioch, and remarkable from his childhood for the
beauty of his person and his sparkling wit, to which he owed his freedom.
His talent soon raised him to eminence as an improvisatore and dramatic
declaimer. He trusted mostly to extempore inspiration when acting his
Mimes, but wrote certain episodes where it was necessary to do so. His
works abounded with moral apophthegms, tersely expressed. We possess 857
verses, arranged in alphabetical order, ascribed to him, of which perhaps
half are genuine. This collection was made early in the Middle Ages, when
it was much used for purposes of education. We append a few examples of
these sayings: [11]
"Beneficium dando accipit, qui digno dedit."
"Furor fit laesa saepius patientia."
"Comes facundus in via pro vehiculo est."
"Nimium altercando veritas amittitur."
"Iniuriarum remedium est oblivio."
"Malum est consilium quod mutari non potest."
"Nunquam periclum sine periclo vincitar."
Horace mentions Laberius not uncomplimentarily, though he professes no
interest in the sort of composition he represented. [12] Perhaps he judged
him by his audience. Besides these two men, CN. MATIUS (about 44 B.C.)
also wrote _Mimiambi_ about the same date. They are described as _Mimicae
fabulae, versibus plerunque iambicis conscriptae_, [13] and appear to have
differed in some way from the actual mimes, probably in not being
represented on the stage. They reappear in the time of Pliny, whose friend
VERGINIUS ROMANUS (he tells us in one of his letters) [14] wrote Mimiambi
_tenuiter, argute, venuste, et in hoc genere eloquentissime_. This shows
that for a long tune a certain refinement and elaboration was compatible
with the style of Mime writing. [15]
The _Pantomimi_ have been confused with the _Mimi_; but they differed in
being dancers, not actors; they represent the inevitable development of
the mimic art, which, as Ovid says in his _Tristia_, [16] even in its
earlier manifestations, enlisted the eye as much as the ear. In Imperial
times they almost engrossed the stage. PYLADES and BATHYLLUS are monuments
of a depraved taste, which could raise these men to offices of state, and
seek their society with such zeal that the emperors were compelled to
issue stringent enactments to forbid it. TIGELLIUS seems to have been the
first of these _effeminati_; he is satirised by Horace, [17] but his
influence was inappreciable compared with that of his successors. The
pantomimus aspired to render the emotions of terror or love more
speakingly by gesture than it was possible to do by speech; and ancient
critics, while deploring, seem to have admitted this claim. The moral
effect of such exhibitions may be imagined. [18]
It is pleasing to find that in Cicero's time the interpretation of the
great dramatists' conceptions exercised the talents of several illustrious
actors, the two best-known of whom are AESOPUS, the tragedian (l22-54
B.C.), and ROSCIUS, the comic actor (120-61? B.C.), [19] After the
exhaustion of dramatic creativeness a period of splendid representation
naturally follows. It was so in Germany and England, it was so at Rome. Of
the two men, Roscius was the greater master; he was so perfect in his art
that his name became a synonym for excellence in any branch. [20] Neither
of them, however, embraced, as Garrick did, both departments of the art;
their provinces were and always remained distinct. Both had the privilege
of Cicero's friendship; both no doubt lent him the benefit of their
professional advice. The interchange of hints between an orator and an
actor was not unexampled. When Hortensius spoke, Roscius always attended
to study his suggestive gestures, and it is told of Cicero himself that he
and Roscius strove which could express the higher emotions more perfectly
by his art. Roscius was a native of Solonium, a Latin town, his praenomen
was Quintus; Aesopus appears to have been a freedman of the Claudia gens.
Of other actors few were well-known enough to merit notice. Some imagine
DOSSENNUS, mentioned by Horace, [21] to have been an actor; but he is much
more likely to be the Fabius Dossennus quoted as an author of _Atellanae_
by Pliny in his _Natural History_ [22] The freedom with which popular
actors were allowed to treat their original is shown by Aesopus on one
occasion (62 B.C.?) changing the words _Brutus qui patriam stabiliverat_
to _Tullius_, a change which, falling in with the people's humour at the
moment, was vociferously applauded, and gratified Cicero's vanity not a
little. [23] Aesopus died soon after (54 B.C.); Roscius did not live so
long. His marvellous beauty when a youth is the subject of a fine epigram
by Lutatius Catulus, already referred to. [24] Both amassed large
fortunes, and lived in princely style.
While the stage was given up to Mimes, cultured men wrote tragedies for
their improvement in command of language. Both Cicero and his brother
wrought assiduously at these frigid imitations. Caesar followed in their
steps; and no doubt the practice was conducive to copiousness and to an
effective simulation of passion. Their appearance as orators before the
people must have called out such different mental qualities from their
cold and calculating intercourse with one another, that tragedy writing as
well as declaiming may have been needful to keep themselves ready for an
emergency. Cicero, as is well known, tried hard to gain fame as a poet.
The ridicule which all ages have lavished on his unhappy efforts has been
a severe punishment for his want of self-knowledge. Still, judging from
the verses that remain, we cannot deny him the praise of a correct and
elegant _versateur_. Besides several translations from Homer and Euripides
scattered through his works, and a few quotations by hostile critics from
his epic attempts, [25] we possess a large part of his translation of
Aratus's _Phaenomena_, written, indeed, in his early days, but a graceful
specimen of Latin verse, and, as Munro [26] has shown, carefully studied
and often imitated by Lucretius. The most noticeable point of metre is his
disregard of the final s, no less than thrice in the first ninety lines, a
practice which in later life he stigmatised as _subrusticum_. In other
respects his hexameters are a decided advance on those of Ennius in point
of smoothness though not of strength. He still affects Greek caesuras
which are not suited to the Latin cadence, [27] and his rhythm generally
lacks variety.
Caesar's pen was nearly as prolific. He wrote besides an _Oedipus_ a poem
called _Laudes Herculis_, and a metrical account of a journey into Spain
called _Iter_. [28] Sportive effusions on various plants are attributed to
him by Pliny. [29] All these Augustus wisely refused to publish; but there
remain two excellent epigrams, one on Terence, already alluded to, which
is undoubtedly genuine, [30] the other probably so, though others ascribe
it to Germanicus or Domitian. [31] But the rhythm, purity of language, and
continuous structure of the couplets seem to point indisputably to an
earlier age. It is as follows--
"Thrax puer, astricto glacie dum ludit in Hebro,
Frigore concretas pondere rupit aquas.
Quumque imae partes rapido traherentur ab amne,
Abscidit, heu! tenerum lubrica testa caput.
Orba quod inventum mater dum conderet urna,
'Hoc peperi flammis, cetera,' dixit, 'aquis.'"
This is evidently a study from the Greek, probably from an Alexandrine
writer.
We have already had occasion more than once to mention the influence of
Alexandria on Roman literature. Since the fall of Carthage Rome had had
much intercourse with the capital of the Greek world. Her thought,
erudition, and style, had acted strongly upon the rude imitators of Greek
refinement. But hitherto the Romans had not been ripe for receiving their
influence in full. In Cicero's time, however, and in a great measure owing
to his labours, Latin composition of all kinds had advanced so far that
writers, and especially poets, began to feel capable of rivalling their
Alexandrian models. This type of Hellenism was so eminently suited to
Roman comprehension that, once introduced, it could not fail to produce
striking results. The results it actually produced were so vast, and in a
way so successful, that we must pause a moment to contemplate the rise of
the city which was connected with them.
Alexander did not err in selecting the mouth of the Nile for the capital
that should perpetuate his name. Its site, its associations, religious,
artistic, and scientific, and the tide of commerce that was certain to
flow through it, all suggested the coast of Egypt as the fittest point of
attraction for the industry of the Eastern world, while the rapid fall of
the other kingdoms that rose from the ruins of his Empire contributed to
make the new Merchant City the natural inheritor of his great ideas. The
Ptolemies well fulfilled the task which Alexander's foresight had set
before them. They aspired to make their capital the centre not only of
commercial but of intellectual production, and the repository of all that
was most venerable in religion, literature, and art. To achieve this end,
they acted with the magnificence as well as the unscrupulousness of great
monarchs. At their command, a princely city rose from the sandhills and
rushes of the Canopic mouth; stately temples uniting Greek proportion with
Egyptian grandeur, long quays with sheltered docks, ingenious contrivances
for purifying the Nile water and conducting a supply to every considerable
house; [32] in short, every product of a luxurious civilisation was found
there, except the refreshing shade of green trees, which, beyond a few of
the commoner kinds, could not be forced to grow on the shifting sandy
soil. The great glory of Alexandria, however, was its public library,
Founded by Soter (306-285 B.C.), greatly extended by Philadelphus (285-247
B.C.), under whom grammatical studies attained their highest development,
enriched by Euergetes (247-212 B.C.) with genuine MSS. of authors
fraudulently obtained from their owners to whom he sent back copies made
by his own librarians, [33] this collection reached under the last-named
sovereign the enormous total of 532,800 volumes, of which the great
majority were kept in the museum which formed part of the royal palace,
and about 50,000 of the most precious in the temple of Serapis, the patron
deity of the city. [34] Connected with the museum were various endowments
analogous to our professorships and fellowships of colleges; under the
Ptolemies the head librarian, in after times the professor of rhetoric,
held the highest post within this ancient university. The librarian was
usually chief priest of one of the greatest gods, Isis, Osiris, or
Serapis. [35] His appointment was for life, and lay at the disposal of the
monarch. Thus the museum was essentially a court institution, and its
_savants_ and _litterateurs_ were accomplished courtiers and men of the
world. Learning being thus nursed as in a hot-bed, its products were rank,
but neither hardy nor natural. They took the form of recondite
mythological erudition, grammar and exegesis, and laborious imitation of
the ancients. In science only was there a healthy spirit of research.
Mathematics were splendidly represented by Euclid and Archimedes,
Geography by Eratosthenes, Astronomy by Hipparchus; for these men, though
not all residents in Alexandria, all gained their principles and method
from study within her walls. To Aristarchus (fl. 180 B.C.) and his
contemporaries we owe the final revision of the Greek classic texts; and
the service thus done to scholarship and literature was incalculable. But
the earlier Alexandrines seem to have been overwhelmed by the vastness of
material at their command. Except in pastoral poetry, which in reality was
not Alexandrine, [36] there was no creative talent shown for centuries.
The true importance of Alexandria in the history of thought dates from
Plotinus (about 200 A.D.), who first clearly taught that mystic philosophy
which under the name of _Neoplatonism_, has had so enduring a fascination
for the human spirit. It was not, however, for philosophy, science, or
theology that the Romans went to Alexandria. It was for literary models
which should less hopelessly defy imitation than those of old Greece, and
for general views of life which should approve themselves to their growing
enlightenment. These they found in the half-Greek, half-cosmopolitan
culture which had there taken root and spread widely in the East. Even
before Alexander's death there had been signs of the internal break-up of
Hellenism, now that it had attained its perfect development. Out of Athens
pure Hellenism had at no time been able to express itself successfully in
literature. And even in Athens the burden of Atticism, if we may say so,
seems to have become too great to bear. We see a desire to emancipate both
thought and expression from the exquisite but confining proportions within
which they had as yet moved. The student of Euripides observes a struggle,
ineffectual it is true, but pregnant with meaning, against all that is
most specially recognised as conservative and national. [37] He strives to
pour new wine into old bottles; but in this case the bottles are too
strong for him to burst. The Atticism which had guided and comprehended,
now began to cramp development. To make a world-wide out of a Hellenic
form of thought, it is necessary to go outside the charmed soil of Greece.
Only on the banks of the Nile will the new culture find a shrine, whose
remote and mysterious authority frees it from the spell of Hellenism, now
no longer the exponent of the world's thought, while it is near enough to
the arena where human progress is fighting its way onward, to inspire and
be inspired by the mighty nation that is succeeding Greece as the
representative of mankind.
The contribution of Alexandria to human progress consists, then, in its
recoil from Greek exclusiveness, in its sifting of what was universal in
Greek thought from what was national, and presenting the former in a
systematised form for the enlightenment of those who received it. This is
its nobler side; the side which men like Ennius and Scipio seized, and
welded into a harmonious union with the higher national tradition of Rome,
out of which union arose that complex product to which the name
_humanitas_ was so happily given. But Alexandrian culture was more than
cosmopolitan. It was in a sense anti-national. Egyptian superstition,
theurgy, magic, and charlatanism of every sort, tried to amalgamate with
the imported Greek culture. In Greece itself they had never done this. The
clear light of Greek intellect had no fellowship with the obscure or the
mysterious. It drove them into corners and let them mutter in secret. But
the moment the lamp of culture was given into other hands, they started up
again unabashed and undismayed. The Alexandrine thinkers struggled to make
Greek influences supreme, to exclude altogether those of the East; and
their efforts were for three centuries successful: neither mysticism nor
magic reigned in the museum of the Ptolemies. But this victory was
purchased at a severe cost. The enthusiasm of the Alexandrian scholars had
made them pedants. They gradually ceased to care for the thought of
literature, and busied themselves only with questions of learning and of
form. Their multifarious reading made them think that they too had a
literary gift. Philetas was not only a profound logician, but he affected
to be an amatory poet. [38] Callimachus, the brilliant and courtly
librarian of Philadelphus, wrote nearly every kind of poetry that existed.
Aratus treated the abstruse investigations of Eudoxus in neat verses that
at once became popular. While in the great periods of Greek art each
writer had been content to excel in a single branch, it now became the
fashion for the same poet to be Epicist, Lyrist, and Elegy-writer at once.
Besides the new treatment of old forms, there were three kinds of poetry,
first developed or perfected at Alexandria, which have special interest
for us from the great celebrity they gained when imported into Rome. They
are the didactic poem, the erotic elegy, and the epigram. The maxim of
Callimachus (characteristic as it is of his narrow mind) _mega biblion
mega kakon_, "a great book is a great evil," [39] was the rule on which
these poetasters generally acted. The didactic poem is an illegitimate
cross between science and poetry. In the creative days of Greece it had no
place. Hesiod, Parmenides, and Empedocles were, indeed, cited as examples.
But in their days poetry was the only vehicle of literary effort, and he
who wished to issue accurate information was driven to embody it in verse.
In the time of the Ptolemies things were altogether different. It was
consistent neither with the exactness of science nor with the grace of the
Muses to treat astronomy or geography as subjects for poetry. Still, the
best masters of this style undoubtedly attained great renown, and have
found brilliant imitators, not only in Roman, but in modern times.
ARATUS (280 B.C.), known as the model of Cicero's, and in a later age of
Domitian's [40] youthful essays in verse, was born at Soli in Cilicia
about three hundred years before Christ. He was not a scientific man, [41]
but popularised in hexameter verse the astronomical works of Eudoxus, of
which he formed two poems, the _Phaenomena_ and the _Diosemia_, or
Prognostics. These were extravagantly praised, and so far took the place
of their original that commentaries were written on them by learned men,
[42] while the works of Eudoxus were in danger of being forgotten.
NICANDER (230 B.C.?), still less ambitious, wrote a poem on remedies for
vegetable and mineral poisons (_alexipharmaka_), and for the bites of
beasts (_thaeriaka_), and another on the habits of birds (_ornithogonia_).
These attracted the imitation of Macer in the Augustan age. But the most
celebrated poets were CALLIMACHUS (260 B.C.) and PHILETAS [43] (280 B.C.),
who formed the models of Propertius. To them we owe the Erotic Elegy,
whether personal or mythological, and all the pedantic ornament of
fictitious passion which such writings generally display. More will be
said about them when we come to the elegiac poets. Callimachus, however,
seems to have carried his art, such as it was, to perfection. He is
generally considered the prince of elegists, and his extant fragments show
great nicety and finish of expression. The sacrilegious theft of the locks
of Berenice's hair from the temple where she had offered them, was a
subject too well suited to a courtier's muse to escape treatment. Its
celebrity is due to the translation made by Catullus, and the
appropriation of the idea by Pope in his _Rape of the Lock_. The short
epigram was also much in vogue at Alexandria, and neat examples abound in
the _Anthology_. But in all these departments the Romans imitated with
such zest and vigour that they left their masters far behind. Ovid and
Martial are as superior in their way to Philetas and Callimachus as
Lucretius and Virgil to Aratus and Apollonius Rhodius. This last-mentioned
poet, APOLLONIUS RHODIUS (fl. 240 B.C.), demands a short notice. He was
the pupil of Callimachus, and the most genuinely-gifted of all the
Alexandrine school; he incurred the envy and afterwards the rancorous
hatred of his preceptor, through whose influence he was obliged to leave
Alexandria and seek fame at Rhodes. Here he remained all his life and
wrote his most celebrated poem, the _Epic of the Argonauts_, a combination
of sentiment, learning, and graceful expression, which is less known than
it ought to be. Its chief interest to us is the use made of it by Virgil,
who studied it deeply and drew much from it. We observe the passion of
love as a new element in heroic poetry, scarcely treated in Greece, but
henceforth to become second to none in prominence, and through Dido, to
secure a place among the very highest flights of song. [44] Jason and
Medea, the hero and heroine, who love one another, create a poetical era.
An epicist of even greater popularity was EUPHORION of Chalcis (274-203
B.C.), whose affected prettiness and rounded cadences charmed the ears of
the young nobles. He had admirers who knew him by heart, who declaimed him
at the baths, [45] and quoted his pathetic passages _ad nauseam_. He was
the inventor of the historical romance in verse, of which Rome was so
fruitful. A Lucan, a Silius, owe their inspiration in part to him. Lastly,
we may mention that the drama could find no place at Alexandria. Only
learned compilations of recondite legend and frigid declamation, almost
unintelligible from the rare and obsolete words with which they were
crowded, were sent forth under the name of plays. The _Cassandra_ or
_Alexandra_ of Lycophron is the only specimen that has come to us. Its
thorny difficulties deter the reader, but Fox speaks of it as breathing a
rich vein of melancholy. The _Thyestes_ of Varius and the _Medea_ of Ovid
were no doubt greatly improved copies of dramas of this sort.
It will be seen from this survey of Alexandrine letters that the better
side of their influence was soon exhausted. Any breadth of view they
possessed was seized and far exceeded by the nobler minds that imitated
it; and all their other qualities were such as to enervate rather than
inspire. The masculine rudeness of the old poets now gave way to pretty
finish; verbal conceits took the place of condensed thoughts; the rich
exuberance of the native style tried to cramp itself into the arid
allusiveness which, instead of painting straight from nature, was content
to awaken a long line of literary associations. Nevertheless there was
much in their manipulation of language from which the Romans could learn a
useful lesson. It was impossible for them to catch the original impulse of
the divine seer [46]--
_autodidaktos d'eimi, theos de moi en phresin oimas pantoias enephysen._
From poverty of genius they were forced to draw less flowing draughts from
the Castalian spring. The bards of old Greece were hopelessly above them.
The Alexandrines, by not overpowering their efforts, but offering them
models which they felt they could not only equal but immeasurably excel,
did real service in encouraging and stimulating the Roman muse. Great
critics like Niebuhr and, within certain limits, Munro, regret the
mingling of the Alexandrine channel with the stream of Latin poetry, but
without it we should perhaps not have had Catullus and certainly neither
Ovid nor Virgil.
It may easily be supposed that the national party, whether in politics or
letters, would set themselves with all their might to oppose the rising
current. The great majority surrendered themselves to it with a good will.
Among the stern reactionists in prose, we have mentioned Varro; in poetry,
by far the greatest name is LUCRETIUS. But little is known of Lucretius's
life; even the date of his birth is uncertain. St. Jerome, in the Eusebian
chronicle, [47] gives 95 B.C. Others have with more probability assigned
an earlier date. It is from Jerome that we learn those facts which have
cast a strong interest round the poet, viz. that he was driven mad by a
love potion, that he composed in the intervals of insanity his poem, which
Cicero afterwards corrected, and that he perished by his own hand in the
forty-fourth year of his age. Jerome does not quote any contemporary
authority; his statements, coming 500 years after the event, must go for
what they are worth, but may perhaps meet with a qualified acceptance. The
intense earnestness of the poem indicates a mind that we can well conceive
giving way under the overwhelming thought which stirred it; and the
example of a philosopher anticipating the stroke of nature is too often
repeated in Roman history to make it incredible in this case. Tennyson
with a poet's sympathy has surrounded this story with the deepest pathos,
and it will probably remain the accepted, if not the established, version
of his death.
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19 |
20 | 21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
25 |
26 |
27 |
28 |
29 |
30 |
31 |
32 |
33 |
34 |
35 |
36 |
37 |
38 |
39 |
40 |
41 |
42 |
43 |
44 |
45 |
46 |
47 |
48 |
49 |
50 |
51 |
52