A History of Roman Literature by Charles Thomas Cruttwell
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Charles Thomas Cruttwell >> A History of Roman Literature
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We shall offer a few critical remarks on the _Pharsalia_, referring our
readers for an exhaustive catalogue of its defects to M. Nisard's second
volume of the _Poetes de la Decadence_, and confining ourselves
principally to such points as he has not dwelt upon. In the first place we
observe a most unfortunate attitude towards the greatest problem that can
exercise man's mind, his relation to the Superior Power. Lucan has neither
the reverence of Virgil, the antagonism of Lucretius, nor the awful doubt
of Greek tragedy. His attitude is one of pretentious rebellion and
flippant accusation, except when Stoic doctrines raise him for a time
above himself. He goes on every occasion quite out of his way to assail
the popular ideas of providence. To Lucretius this is a necessity entailed
upon him by his subject; to Lucan it is nothing but petulant rhetorical
outburst. For instance, he calls Ptolemy _Fortunae pudor crimenque
deorum_; [34] he arraigns the gods as caring more for vengeance than
liberty; [35] he calls Septimius a disgrace to the gods, [36] the death of
Pompey a tale at which heaven ought to blush; [37] he speaks of the
expression on Pompey's venerable face as one of anger against the gods,
[38] of the stone that marks his tomb as an indictment against heaven,
[39] and hopes that it may soon be considered as false a witness of his
death as Crete is to that of Jove; [40] he makes young Pompey, speaking of
his father's death, say: "Whatever insult of fate has scattered his limbs
to the winds, I forgive the gods that wrong, it is of what they have left
that I complain;" [41] saddest of all, he gives us that tremendous
epigram: [42]
"Victrix causa deis placuit, sed victa Catoni."
We recognise here a noble but misguided spirit, fretting at the
dispensations it cannot approve, because it cannot understand them.
Bitterly disgusted at the failure of the Empire to fulfil all its promise,
the writers of this period waste their strength in unavailing upbraidings
of the gods. There is a retrograde movement of thought since the Augustan
age. Virgil and Horace take substantially the same view of the Empire as
that which the philosophy of history has taught us is the true one; they
call it a necessity, and express that belief by deifying its
representative. Contrast the spirit of Horace in the third Ode of the
third book:
"Hac arte Pollux hac vagus Hercules
Enisus arces attigit igneas;
Quos inter Augustus recumbens
Purpureo bibit ore nectar,"
with the fierce irony of Lucan: [43]
"Mortalis nulli
Sunt curata deo; cladis tamen huius habemus
_Vindictam_, quantam terris dare numina fas est.
Bella pares superis faciunt civilia divos;
Fulminibus manes radiisque ornabit et astris,
Inque Deum templis iurabit Roma per _umbras_."
Here is the satire of Cicero's second Philippic reappearing, but with
added bitterness. [44] Being thus without belief in a divine providence,
how does Lucan govern the world? By blind fate, or blinder caprice!
_Fortuna_, whom Juvenal ridicules, [45] is the true deity of Lucan. As
such she is directly mentioned ninety-one times, besides countless others
where her agency is implied. A useful belief for a man like Caesar who
fought his way to empire; a most unfortunate conception for an epic poet
to build a great poem on.
Lucan's scepticism has this further disadvantage that it precludes him
from the use of the supernatural. To introduce the council of Olympus as
Virgil does would in him be sheer mockery, and he is far too honest to
attempt it. But as no great poet can dispense with some reference to the
unseen, Lucan is driven to its lower and less poetic spheres. Ghosts,
witches, dreams, visions, and portents, fill with their grisly catalogue a
disproportionate space of the poem. The sibyl is introduced as in Virgil,
but instead of giving her oracle with solemn dignity, she first refuses to
speak at all, then under threats of cruel punishment she submits to the
influence of the god, but in the midst of the prophetic impulse, Apollo,
for some unexplained reason, compels her to stop short and conceal the
gist of her message. [46] Even more unpleasant is the description of
Sextus Pompeius's consultation of the witch Erichtho; [47] horror upon
horror is piled up until the blood curdles at the sickening details, which
even Southey's _Thalaba_ does not approach--and, after all, the feeling
produced is not horror but disgust.
It is pleasant to turn from his irreligion to his philosophy. Here he
appears as an uncertain but yet ardent disciple of the Porch. His
uncertainty is shown by his inability to answer many grave doubts, as: Why
is the future revealed by presages? [48] why are the oracles, once so
vocal, now silent? [49] his enthusiasm by his portraiture of Cato, who was
regarded by the Stoics as coming nearest of all men to their ideal Wise
Man. Cato is to him a peg on which to hang the virtues and paradoxes of
the school. But none the less is the sketch he gives a truly noble one:
[50]
"Hi mores, haec duri immota Catonis
Secta fuit, servare modum finemque tenere,
Naturamque sequi, patriaeque impendere vitam,
Nec sibi sed toti genitum se credere mundo."
Nothing in all Latin poetry reaches a higher pitch of ethical sublimity
than Cato's reply to Labienus when entreated to consult the oracle of
Jupiter Ammon: [51] "What would you have me ask? whether I ought to die
rather than become a slave? whether life begins here or after death?
whether evil can hurt the good man? whether it be enough to will what is
good? whether virtue is made greater by success? All this I know already,
and Hammon's voice will not make it more sure. We all depend on Heaven,
and though oracles be silent we cannot act without the will of God. Deity
needs no witness: once for all at our birth he has given us all needful
knowledge, nor has he chosen barren sands accessible to few, or buried
truth in a desert. Where earth, sea, sky, and virtue exist, there is God.
Why seek we Heaven outside?" These, and similar other sentiments scattered
throughout the poem, redeem it from the charge of wanton disbelief, and
show a largeness of soul that only needed experience to make it truly
great.
In discussing political and social questions Lucan shows considerable
insight. He could not, any more than his contemporaries, understand that
the old oligarchy was an anachronism; that the stubborn pride of its
votaries needed the sword to break it. But the influence of individual
genius is well pourtrayed by him, and he seizes character with a vigorous
grasp. As a partisan of the senate, he felt bound to exalt Pompey; but if
we judge by his own actions and his own words, not by the encomiums heaped
on him by the poet, Lucan's Pompey comes very near the genuine historical
man. So the Caesar sketched by Lucan, though meant to be a villain of the
blackest dye--if we except some blood-thirsty speeches--stands out as a
true giant of energy, neither meaner nor more unscrupulous than the Caesar
of history. Domitius, Curio, and Lentulus, are vigorous though somewhat
defective portraits. Cornelia is the only female character that calls for
notice. She is drawn with breadth and sympathy, and bears all the traits
of a great Roman matron. The degradation of the people is a constant theme
of lamentation. It is wealth, luxury, and the effeminacy that comes with
them that have softened the fibre of Rome, and made her willing to bear a
master. This is indeed a common-place of the schools, but it is none the
less a gloomy truth, and Lucan would have been no Roman had he omitted to
complain of it. Equally characteristic is his contempt for the lower
orders [52] and the influx of foreigners, of whom Rome had become the
common sink. Juvenal, who evidently studied Lucan, drew from him the
picture of the Tiber soiled by Orontes's foul stream, and of the
Bithynian, Galatian, and Cappadocian knights. [53]
With regard to the artistic side of the poem the first and most obvious
criticism is that it has no hero. But if this be a fault, it is one which
it shares with the _Divina Commedia_ and _Paradise Lost_. As Satan has
been called the hero of the latter poem, so Caesar, if not the hero, is
the protagonist of the _Pharsalia_. But Cato, Pompey, and the senate as a
body, have all competed for this honour. The fact is this: that while the
primitive epic is altogether personal, the poem whose interest is national
or human cannot always find a single hero. It is after all a narrow
criticism that confines the poet's art within such strict limits. A great
poet can hardly avoid changing or at least modifying the existing canons
of art, and Lucan should at least be judged with the same liberality as
the old annalists who celebrated the wars of the Republic.
In description Lucan is excellent, both in action and still life, but more
in brilliancy of detail than in broad effects. His defect lies in the tone
of exaggeration which he has acquired in the schools, and thinks it right
to employ in order not to fall below his subject. He has a true opinion of
the importance of the Civil War, which he judges to be the final crisis of
Rome's history, and its issues fraught with superhuman grandeur. The
innate materialism of his mind, however, leads him to attach _outward_
magnitude to all that is connected with it. Thus Nero, the offspring of
its throes, is entreated by the poet to be careful, when he leaves earth
to take his place among the immortals, not to seat himself in a quarter
where his weight may disturb the just equilibrium of the globe! [54] And,
similarly, all the incidents of the Civil War exceed the parallel
incidents of every other war in terror and vastness. Do portents presage a
combat? they are such as defy all power to conceive. Pindus mounts upon
Olympus, [55] and others of a more ordinary but still amazing character
follow. [56] Does a naval conflict take place? the horrors of all the
elements combine to make it the most hideous that the mind can imagine.
Fire and water vie with each other in devising new modes of death, and
where these are inactive, it is only because a land-battle with all its
carnage is being enacted on the closely-wedged ships. [57] Has the army to
march across a desert? the entire race of venomous serpents conspires to
torture and if possible extirpate the host! [58] This is a very inartistic
mode of heightening effect, and, indeed, borders closely on that pursued
in the modern _sensation_ novel. It is beyond question the worst defect of
the _Pharsalia_, and the extraordinary ingenuity with which it is done
only intensifies the misconduct of the poet.
Over and above this habitual exaggeration, Lucan has a decided love for
the ghastly and revolting. The instances to which allusion has already
been made, viz. the Thessalian sorceress and the dreadful casualties of
the sea-fight, show it very strikingly, but the account of the serpents in
the Libyan desert, if possible, still more. The episode is of great
length, over three hundred lines, and contains much mythological
knowledge, as well as an appalling power of description. It begins with a
discussion of the question, Why is Africa so full of these plagues? After
giving various hypotheses he adopts the one which assigns their origin to
Medusa's hairs which fell from Perseus's hand as he sailed through the
air. In order not to lure people to certain death by appearing in an
inhabited country, he chose the trackless wastes of Africa over which to
wing his flight. The mythological disquisition ended, one on natural
history follows. The peculiar properties of the venom of each species are
minutely catalogued, first in abstract terms, then in the concrete by a
description of their effects on some of Cato's soldiers. The first bitten
was the standard-bearer Aulus, by a dipsas, which afflicted him with
intolerable thirst; next Sabellus by a seps, a minute creature whose bite
was followed by an instantaneous corruption of the whole body; [59] then
Nasidius by a prester which caused his form to swell to an unrecognisable
size, and so on through the list of serpents, each episode closing with a
brilliant epigram which clenches the effect. [60] Trivialities like these
would spoil the greatest poem ever penned. It need not be said that they
spoil the _Pharsalia_.
Another subject on which Lucan rings the changes is death. The word _mors_
has an unwholesome attraction to his ear. Death is to him the greatest
gift of heaven; the only one it cannot take away. It is sad indeed to hear
the young poet uttering sentiments like this: [61]
"Scire mori sors prima viris, sed proxima cogi,"
and again [62]--
"Victurosque dei celant, ut vivere durent,
Felix esse mori."
So in cursing Crastinus, Caesar's fierce centurion, he wishes him not to
die, but to retain sensibility after death, in other words to be immortal.
The sentiment occurs, not once but a hundred times, that of all pleasures
death is the greatest. He even plays upon the word, using it in senses
which it will hardly bear. _Libycae mortes_ are serpents; _Accessit morti
Libye_, "Libya added to the mortality of the army;" _nulla cruentae tantum
mortis habet_; "no other reptile causes a death so bloody." To one so
unhealthily familiar with the idea, the reality, when it came, seems to
have brought unusual terrors.
The learning of Lucan has been much extolled, and in some respects not
without reason. It is complex, varied, and allusive, but its extreme
obscurity makes us suspect even when we cannot prove, inaccuracy. He is
proud of his manifold acquirements. Nothing pleases him more than to have
an excuse for showing his information on some abstruse subject. The causes
of the climate of Africa, the meteorological conditions of Spain, the
theory of the globes, the geography of the southern part of our
hemisphere, the wonders of Egypt and the views about the source of the
Nile, are descanted on with diffuse erudition. But it is evidently
impossible that so mere a youth could have had a deep knowledge of so many
subjects, especially as his literary productiveness had already been very
great. He had written an _Iliacon_ according to Statius, [63] a book of
_Saturnalia_, ten books of _Silvae_, a _Catachthonion_, an unfinished
tragedy called _Medea_, fourteen _Salticae fabulae_ (no doubt out of
compliment to Nero), a prose essay against Octavius Sagitta, another in
favour of him, a poem _De Incendio Urbis_, in which Nero was satirised, a
_katakausmos_ (which is perhaps different from the latter, but may be only
the same under another title), a series of letters from Campania, and an
address to his wife, Polla Argentaria.
A peculiar, and to us offensive, exhibition of learning consists in those
tirades on common-place themes, embodying all the stock current of
instances, of which the earliest example is found in the catalogue of the
dead in Virgil's _Culex_. Lucan, as may be supposed, delights in dressing
up these well-worn themes, painting them with novel splendour if they are
descriptive, thundering in fiery epigrams, if they are moral. Of the
former class are two of the most effective scenes in the poem. The first
is Caesar's night voyage in a skiff over a stormy sea. The fisherman to
whom he applies is unwilling to set sail. The night, he says, shows many
threatening signs, and, by way of deterring Caesar, he enumerates the
entire list of prognostics to be found in Aratus, Hesiod, and Virgil, with
great piquancy of touch, but without the least reference to the propriety
of the situation. [64] Nothing can be more amusing, or more out of place,
than the old man's sudden erudition. The second is the death of Scaeva,
who for a time defended Caesar's camp single-handed. The poet first
remarks that valour in a bad cause is a crime, and then depicts that of
Scaeva in such colossal proportions as almost pass the limits of
burlesque. After describing him as pierced with so many spears that they
served him _as armour_, he adds: [65]
"Nec quicquam nudis vitalibus obstat
Iam, praeter stantes in _summis ossibus_ hastas."
This is grotesque enough; the banquet of birds and beasts who feed on the
skin of Pharsalia is even worse. [66] The details are too loathsome to
quote. Suffice it to say that the list includes every carrion-feeder among
flesh and fowl who assemble in immense flocks:
"Nunquam tanto se vulture caelum
_Induit_, aut plures _presserunt_ aethere pennae."
We have, however, dwelt too long on points like these. We must now notice
a few features of his style which mark him as the representative of an
epoch. First, his extreme cleverness. In splendid extravagance of
expression no Latin author comes near him. The miniature painting of
Statius, the point of Martial, are both feeble in comparison; for Lucan's
language, though often tasteless, is always strong. Some of his lines
embody a condensed trenchant vigour which has made them proverbs. Phrases
like _Trahimur sub nomine pacis--Momentumque fuit mutatus Curio rerum_,
recall the pen of Tacitus. Others are finer still Caesar's energy is
rivalled by the line--
"Nil actum credens dum quid superesset agendum."
The duty of securing liberty, even at the cost of blood, was never more
finely expressed than by the noble words:
"Ignoratque datos ne quisquam serviat enses."
Curio's treachery is pilloried in the epigram,
"Emere omnes, hic vendidit Urbem." [67]
The mingled cowardice and folly of servile obedience is nobly expressed by
his reproach to the people:
"Usque adeone times, quem tu facis ipse timendum?" [68]
An author who could write like this had studied rhetoric to some purpose.
Unhappily he is oftener diffuse than brief, and sometimes he becomes
tedious to the last degree. His poetical art is totally deficient in
variety. He knows of but one method of gaining effect, the use of strong
language and plenty of it. If Persius was inflated with the vain desire to
surpass Horace, Lucan seems to have been equally ambitious of excelling
Virgil. He rarely imitates, but he frequently competes with him. Over and
over again, he approaches the same or similar subjects. Virgil had
described the victory of Hercules over Cacus, Lucan must celebrate his
conflict with Antaeus; Virgil had mentioned the portents that followed
Caesar's death, Lucan must repeat them with added improbabilities in a
fresh context; his sibyl is but a tasteless counterpart of Virgil's; his
catalogues of forces have Virgil's constantly in view; his deification of
Nero is an exaggeration of that of Augustus, and even the celebrated
simile in which Virgil admits his obligations to the Greek stage has its
parallel in the _Pharsalia_. [69]
Nevertheless Lucan is of all Latin poets the most independent in relation
to his predecessors. It needs a careful criticism to detect his knowledge
and imitation of Virgil. As far as other poets go he might never have read
their works. The impetuous course of the _Pharsalia_ is interrupted by no
literary reminiscences, no elaborate setting of antique gems. He was a
stranger to that fond pleasure with which Virgil entwined his poetry round
the spreading branches of the past, and wove himself a wreath out of
flowers new and old. This lack of delicate feeling is no less evident in
his rhythm. Instead of the inextricable harmonies of Virgil's cadence, we
have a succession of rich, forcible, and polished monotonous lines,
rushing on without a thought of change until the period closes. In formal
skill Lucan was a proficient, but his ear was dull. The same caesuras
recur again and again, [70] and the only merit of his rhythm is its
undeniable originality. [71] The composition of the _Pharsalia_ must,
however, have been extremely hurried, judging both from the fact that
three books only were finished the year before the poet's death, and from
various indications of haste in the work itself. The tenth book is
obviously unfinished, and in style is far more careless than the rest.
Lucan's diction is tolerably classical, but he is lax in the employment of
certain words, _e.g. mors, fatum, pati_ (in the sense of _vivere_), and
affects forced combinations from the desire to be terse, _e.g., degener
toga_, [72] _stimulis negare_, [73] _nutare regna_, "to portend the advent
of despotism;" [74] _meditari Leucada_, "to intend to bring about the
catastrophe of Actium," [75] and so on. We observe also several
innovations in syntax, especially the freer use of the infinitive (_vivere
durent_) after verbs, or as a substantive, a defect he shares with Persius
(_scire tuum_); and the employment of the future participle to state a
possibility or a condition that might have been fulfilled, _e.g., unumque
caput tam magna iuventus Privatum_ factura _timet velut ensibus ipse
Imperet invito_ moturus _milite bellum_. [76] A strong depreciation of
Lucan's genius has been for some time the rule of criticism. And in an age
when little time is allowed for reading any but the best authors, it is
perhaps undesirable that he should be rehabilitated. Yet throughout the
Middle Ages and during more than one great epoch in French history, he was
ranked among the highest epic poets. Even now there are many scholars who
greatly admire him. The false metaphor and exaggerated tone may be
condoned to a youth of twenty-six; the lofty pride and bold devotion to
liberty could not have been acquired by an ignoble spirit. He is of value
to science as a moderately accurate historian who supplements Caesar's
narrative, and gives a faithful picture of the feeling general among the
nobility of his day. He is also a prominent representative of that gifted
Spanish family who, in various ways, exercised so immense an influence on
subsequent Roman letters. His wife is said to have assisted in the
composition of the poem, but in what part of it her talents fitted her to
succeed we cannot even conjecture.
To Nero's reign are probably to be referred the seven eclogues of T.
CALPURNIUS SICULUS, and the poem on Aetna, long attributed to Virgil.
These may bear comparison in respect of their want of originality with the
_Satires_ of Persius, though both fall far short of them in talent and
interest. The MSS. of Calpurnius contain, besides the seven genuine poems,
four others by a later and much inferior writer, probably Nemesianus, the
same who wrote a poem on the chase in the reign of Numerian. These are
imitated from Calpurnius much as he imitates Virgil, except that the
decline in metrical treatment is greater. The first eclogue of Calpurnius
is devoted to the praises of a young emperor who is to regenerate the
world, and exercise a wisdom, a clemency, and a patronage of the arts long
unknown. He is celebrated again in Eclogue IV., the most pretentious of
the series, and, in general, critics are agreed that Nero is intended. The
second poem is the most successful of all, and a short account of it may
be given here. Astacus and Idas, two beauteous youths, enter into a
poetical contest at which Thyrsis acts as judge. Faunus, the satyrs, and
nymphs, "Sicco Dryades pede Naides udo," are present. The rivers stay
their course; the winds are hushed; the oxen forget their pasture; the bee
steadies itself on poised wing to listen. An amoebean contest ensues, in
which the rivals closely imitate those of Virgil's seventh eclogue,
singing against one another in stanzas of four lines. Thyrsis declines to
pronounce either conqueror:
"Este pares: et ab hoc concordes vivite: nam vos
Et decor et cantus et amor sociavit et aetas."
The rhythm is pleasing; the style simple and flowing; and if we did not
possess the model we might admire the copy. The tone of exaggeration which
characterises all the poetry of Nero's time mars the reality of these
pastoral scenes. The author professes great reverence for Virgil, but does
not despair of being coupled with him (vi. 64):
"Magna petis Corydon, si Tityrus esse laboras."
And he begs his wealthy friend Meliboeus (perhaps Seneca) to introduce his
poems to the emperor (Ecl. iv. 157), and so fulfil for him the office that
he who led Tityrus to Rome did for the Mantuan bard. If his vanity is
somewhat excessive we must allow him the merits of a correct and pretty
versifier.
The didactic poem on Aetna is now generally attributed to LUCILIUS JUNIOR,
the friend and correspondent of Seneca. Scaliger printed it with Virgil's
works, and others have assigned Cornelius Severus as the author, but
several considerations tend to fix our choice on Lucilius. First, the poem
is beyond doubt much later than the Augustan age; the constant
reproduction, often unconscious, of Virgil's form of expression, implies
an interval of at least a generation; allusions to Manilius [77] may be
detected, and perhaps to Petronius Arbiter, [78] but at the same time it
seems to have been written before the great eruption of Vesuvius (69
A.D.), in which Pliny lost his life, since no mention is made of that
event. All these conditions are fulfilled by Lucilius. Moreover, he is
described by Seneca as a man who by severe and conscientious study had
raised his position in life (which is quite what we should imagine from
reading the poem), and whose literary attainments were greatly due to
Seneca's advice and care. "Assero te mihi: meum opus es," he says in one
of his epistles, [79] and in another he asks him for the long promised
account of a voyage round Sicily which Lucilius had made. He goes on to
say, "I hope you will describe Aetna, the theme of so many poets' song.
Ovid was not deterred from attempting it though Virgil had occupied the
ground, nor did the success of both of these deter Cornel. Severus. If I
know you Aetna excites in you the desire to write; you wish to try some
great work which shall equal the fame of your predecessors." [80] As the
poem further shows some resemblances to an essay on Aetna, published by
Seneca himself, the conclusion is almost irresistible that Lucilius is its
author.
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