Dictate
therefore
something worthy of your promises;
begin.
begin.
Horace - Works
" "May I die!
if I be either
able to stand it out, or have any knowledge of the civil laws: and
besides, I am in a hurry, you know whither. " "I am in doubt what I shall
do," said he; "whether desert you or my cause. " "Me, I beg of you. " "I
will not do it," said he; and began to take the lead of me. I (as it is
difficult to contend with one's master) follow him. "How stands it with
Maecenas and you? " Thus he begins his prate again. "He is one of few
intimates, and of a very wise way of thinking. No man ever made use of
opportunity with more cleverness. You should have a powerful assistant,
who could play an underpart, if you were disposed to recommend this man;
may I perish, if you should not supplant all the rest! " "We do not live
there in the manner you imagine; there is not a house that is freer or
more remote from evils of this nature. It is never of any disservice to
me, that any particular person is wealthier or a better scholar than I
am: every individual has his proper place. " "You tell me a marvelous
thing, scarcely credible. " "But it is even so. " "You the more inflame my
desires to be near his person. " "You need only be inclined to it: such
is your merit, you will accomplish it: and he is capable of being won;
and on that account the first access to him he makes difficult. " "I will
not be wanting to myself: I will corrupt his servants with presents; if
I am excluded to-day, I will not desist; I will seek opportunities; I
will meet him in the public streets; I will wait upon him home. Life
allows nothing to mortals without great labor. " While he was running on
at this rate, lo! Fuscus Aristius comes up, a dear friend of mine, and
one who knows the fellow well. We make a stop. "Whence come you? whither
are you going? " he asks and answers. I began to twitch him [by the
elbow], and to take hold of his arms [that were affectedly] passive,
nodding and distorting my eyes, that he might rescue me. Cruelly arch
he laughs, and pretends not to take the hint: anger galled my liver.
"Certainly," [said I, "Fuscus,] you said that you wanted to communicate
something to me in private. " "I remember it very well; but will tell it
you at a better opportunity: to-day is the thirtieth sabbath. Would you
affront the circumcised Jews? " I reply, "I have no scruple [on that
account]. " "But I have: I am something weaker, one of the multitude. You
must forgive me: I will speak with you on another occasion. " And has
this sun arisen so disastrous upon me! The wicked rogue runs away, and
leaves me under the knife. But by luck his adversary met him: and,
"Whither are you going, you infamous fellow? " roars he with a loud
voice: and, "Do you witness the arrest? " I assent. He hurries him into
court: there is a great clamor on both sides, a mob from all parts. Thus
Apollo preserved me.
* * * * *
SATIRE X.
_He supports the judgment which he had before given of Lucilius, and
intersperses some excellent precepts for the writing of Satire. _
To be sure I did say, that the verses of Lucilius did not run smoothly.
Who is so foolish an admirer of Lucilius, that he would not own this?
But the same writer is applauded in the same Satire, on account of his
having lashed the town with great humor. Nevertheless granting him this,
I will not therefore give up the other [considerations]; for at that
rate I might even admire the farces of Laberius, as fine poems. Hence it
is by no means sufficient to make an auditor grim with laughter: and yet
there is some degree of merit even in this. There is need of conciseness
that the sentence may run, and not embarrass itself with verbiage, that
overloads the sated ear; and sometimes a grave, frequently jocose style
is necessary, supporting the character one while of the orator and [at
another] of the poet, now and then that of a graceful rallier that curbs
the force of his pleasantry and weakens it on purpose. For ridicule
often decides matters of importance more effectually and in a better
manner, than severity. Those poets by whom the ancient comedy was
written, stood upon this [foundation], and in this are they worthy of
imitation: whom neither the smooth-faced Hermogenes ever read, nor that
baboon who is skilled in nothing but singing [the wanton compositions
of] Calvus and Catullus.
But [Lucilius, say they,] did a great thing, when he intermixed Greek
words with Latin. O late-learned dunces! What! do you think that arduous
and admirable, which was done by Pitholeo the Rhodian? But [still they
cry] the style elegantly composed of both tongues is the more pleasant,
as if Falernian wine is mixed with Chian. When you make verses, I ask
you this question; were you to undertake the difficult cause of the
accused Petillius, would you (for instance), forgetful of your country
and your father, while Pedius, Poplicola, and Corvinus sweat through
their causes in Latin, choose to intermix words borrowed from abroad,
like the double-tongued Canusinian. And as for myself, who was born on
this side the water, when I was about making Greek verses; Romulus
appearing to me after midnight, when dreams are true, forbade me in
words to this effect; "You could not be guilty of more madness by
carrying timber into a wood, than by desiring to throng in among the
great crowds of Grecian writers. "
While bombastical Alpinus murders Memnon, and while he deforms the muddy
source of the Rhine, I amuse myself with these satires; which can
neither be recited in the temple [of Apollo], as contesting for the
prize when Tarpa presides as judge, nor can have a run over and over
again represented in the theatres. You, O Fundanius, of all men
breathing are the most capable of prattling tales in a comic vein, how
an artful courtesan and a Davus impose upon an old Chremes. Pollio sings
the actions of kings in iambic measure; the sublime Varias composes the
manly epic, in a manner that no one can equal: to Virgil the Muses,
delighting in rural scenes, have granted the delicate and the elegant.
It was this kind [of satiric writing], the Aticinian Varro and some
others having attempted it without success, in which I may have some
slight merit, inferior to the inventor: nor would I presume to pull off
the [laurel] crown placed upon his brow with great applause.
But I said that he flowed muddily, frequently indeed bearing along more
things which ought to be taken away than left. Be it so; do you, who are
a scholar, find no fault with any thing in mighty Homer, I pray? Does
the facetious Lucilius make no alterations in the tragedies of Accius?
Does not he ridicule many of Ennius' verses, which are too light for
the gravity [of the subject]? When he speaks of himself by no means as
superior to what he blames. What should hinder me likewise, when I am
reading the works of Lucilius, from inquiring whether it be his
[genius], or the difficult nature of his subject, that will not suffer
his verses to be more finished, and to run more smoothly than if some
one, thinking it sufficient to conclude a something of six feet, be fond
of writing two hundred verses before he eats, and as many after supper?
Such was the genius of the Tuscan Cassius, more impetuous than a rapid
river; who, as it is reported, was burned [at the funeral pile] with his
own books and papers. Let it be allowed, I say, that Lucilius was a
humorous and polite writer; that he was also more correct than [Ennius],
the author of a kind of poetry [not yet] well cultivated, nor attempted
by the Greeks, and [more correct likewise] than the tribe of our old
poets: but yet he, if he had been brought down by the Fates to this age
of ours, would have retrenched a great deal from his writings: he would
have pruned off every thing that transgressed the limits of perfection;
and, in the composition of verses, would often have scratched his head,
and bit his nails to the quick.
You that intend to write what is worthy to be read more than once, blot
frequently: and take no-pains to make the multitude admire you, content
with a few [judicious] readers. What, would you be such a fool as to be
ambitious that your verses should be taught in petty schools? That is
not my case. It is enough for me, that the knight [Maecenas] applauds:
as the courageous actress, Arbuscula, expressed herself, in contempt of
the rest of the audience, when she was hissed [by the populace]. What,
shall that grubworm Pantilius have any effect upon me? Or can it vex me,
that Demetrius carps at me behind my back? or because the trifler
Fannius, that hanger-on to Hermogenes Tigellius, attempts to hurt me?
May Plotius and Varius, Maecenas and Virgil, Valgius and Octavius
approve these Satires, and the excellent Fuscus likewise; and I could
wish that both the Visci would join in their commendations: ambition
apart, I may mention you, O Pollio: you also, Messala, together with
your brother; and at the same time, you, Bibulus and Servius; and along
with these you, candid Furnius; many others whom, though men of learning
and my friends, I purposely omit--to whom I would wish these Satires,
such as they are, may give satisfaction; and I should be chagrined, if
they pleased in a degree below my expectation. You, Demetrius, and you,
Tigellius, I bid lament among the forms of your female pupils.
Go, boy, and instantly annex this Satire to the end of my book.
* * * * *
THE SECOND BOOK OF THE SATIRES OF HORACE.
SATIRE I.
_He supposes himself to consult with Trebatius, whether he should desist
from writing satires, or not_.
There are some persons to whom I seem too severe in [the writing of]
satire, and to carry it beyond proper bounds: another set are of
opinion, that all I have written is nerveless, and that a thousand
verses like mine may be spun out in a day. Trebatius, give me your
advice, what shall I do. Be quiet. I should not make, you say, verses at
all. I do say so. May I be hanged, if that would not be best: but I can
not sleep. Let those, who want sound sleep, anointed swim thrice across
the Tiber: and have their clay well moistened with wine over-night. Or,
if such a great love of scribbling hurries you on, venture to celebrate
the achievements of the invincible Caesar, certain of bearing off ample
rewards for your pains.
Desirous I am, my good father, [to do this,] but my strength fails me,
nor can any one describe the troops bristled with spears, nor the Gauls
dying on their shivered darts, nor the wounded Parthian falling from his
horse. Nevertheless you may describe him just and brave, as the wise
Lucilius did Scipio. I will not be wanting to myself, when an
opportunity presents itself: no verses of Horace's, unless well-timed,
will gain the attention of Caesar; whom, [like a generous steed,] if you
stroke awkwardly, he will kick upon you, being at all quarters on his
guard. How much better would this be, than to wound with severe satire
Pantolabus the buffoon, and the rake Nomentanus! when every body is
afraid for himself, [lest he should be the next,] and hates you, though
he is not meddled with. What shall I do? Milonius falls a dancing the
moment he becomes light-headed and warm, and the candles appear
multiplied. Castor delights in horsemanship: and he, who sprang from the
same egg, in boxing. As many thousands of people [as there are in the
world], so many different inclinations are there. It delights me to
combine words in meter, after the manner of Lucilius, a better man than
both of us. He long ago communicated his secrets to his books, as to
faithful friends; never having recourse elsewhere, whether things went
well or ill with him: whence it happens, that the whole life of this old
[poet] is as open to the view, as if it had been painted en a votive
tablet. His example I follow, though in doubt whether I am a Lucanian or
an Apulian; for the Venusinian farmers plow upon the boundaries of both
countries, who (as the ancient tradition has it) were sent, on the
expulsion of the Samnites, for this purpose, that the enemy might not
make incursions on the Romans, through a vacant [unguarded frontier]: or
lest the Apulian nation, or the fierce Lucanian, should make an
invasion. But this pen of mine shall not willfully attack any man
breathing, and shall defend me like a sword that is sheathed in the
scabbard which why should I attempt to draw, [while I am] safe from
hostile villains? O Jupiter, father and sovereign, may my weapon laid
aside wear away with rust, and may no one injure me, who am desirous of
peace? But that man shall provoke me (I give notice, that it is better
not to touch me) shall weep [his folly], and as a notorious character
shall be sung through all the streets of Rome.
Cervius, when he is offended, threatens one with the laws and the
[judiciary] urn; Canidia, Albutius' poison to those with whom she is at
enmity, Turius [threatens] great damages, if you contest any thing while
he is judge. How every animal terrifies those whom he suspects, with
that in which he is most powerful, and how strong natural instinct
commands this, thus infer with me. --The wolf attacks with his teeth, the
bull with his horns. From what principle is this, if not a suggestion
from within? Intrust that debauchee Scaeva with the custody of his
ancient mother; his pious hand will commit no outrage. A wonder indeed!
just as the wolf does not attack any one with his hoof, nor the bull
with his teeth; but the deadly hemlock in the poisoned honey will take
off the old dame.
That I may not be tedious, whether a placid old age awaits me, or
whether death now hovers about me with his sable wings; rich or poor, at
Rome or (if fortune should so order it) an exile abroad; whatever be the
complexion of my life, I will write. O my child, I fear you can not be
long, lived; and that some creature of the great ones will strike you
with the cold of death. What? when Lucilius had the courage to be the
first in composing verses after this manner, and to pull off that mask,
by means of which each man strutted in public view with a fair outside,
though foul within; was Laelius, and he who derived a well deserved
title from the destruction of Carthage, offended at his wit, or were
they hurt at Metellus being lashed, or Lupus covered over with his
lampoons? But he took to task the heads of the people, and the people
themselves, class by class; in short, he spared none but virtue and her
friends. Yet, when the valorous Scipio, and the mild philosophical
Laelius, had withdrawn themselves from the crowd and the public scene,
they used to divert themselves with him, and joke in a free manner,
while a few vegetables were boiled [for supper]. Of whatever rank I am,
though below the estate and wit of Lucilius, yet envy must be obliged to
own that I have lived well with great men; and, wanting to fasten her
tooth upon some weak part, will strike it against the solid: unless you,
learned Trebatius, disapprove of any thing [I have said]. For my part, I
can not make any objection to this. But however, that forewarned you may
be upon your guard, lest in ignorance of our sacred laws should bring
you into trouble, [be sure of this] if any person shall make scandalous
verses against a particular man, an action lies, and a sentence.
Granted, if they are scandalous: but if a man composes good ones, and is
praised by such a judge as Caesar? If a man barks only at him who
deserves his invectives, while he himself is unblamable? The process
will be canceled with laughter: and you, being dismissed, may depart in
peace.
* * * * *
SATIRE II.
_On Frugality_.
What and how great is the virtue to live on a little (this is no
doctrine of mine, but what Ofellus the peasant, a philosopher without
rules and of a home-spun wit, taught me), learn, my good friends, not
among dishes and splendid tables; when the eye is dazzled with the vain
glare, and the mind, intent upon false appearances, refuses [to admit]
better things; but here, before dinner, discuss this point with me. Why
so? I will inform you, if I can. Every corrupted judge examines badly
the truth. After hunting the hare, or being wearied by an unruly horse,
or (if the Roman exercise fatigues you, accustomed to act the Greek)
whether the swift ball, while eagerness softens and prevents your
perceiving the severity of the game, or quoits (smite the yielding air
with the quoit) when exercise has worked of squeamishness, dry and
hungry, [then let me see you] despise mean viands; and don't drink
anything but Hymettian honey qualified with Falernian wine. Your butler
is abroad, and the tempestuous sea preserves the fish by its wintery
storms; bread and salt will sufficiently appease an importunate stomach.
Whence do you think this happens? and how is it obtained? The consummate
pleasure is not in the costly flavor, but in yourself. Do you seek for
sauce by sweating. Neither oysters, nor scar, nor the far-fetched
lagois, can give any pleasure to one bloated and pale through
intemperance. Nevertheless, if a peacock were served up, I should hardly
be able to prevent your gratifying the palate with that, rather than a
pullet, since you are prejudiced by the vanities of things; because the
scarce bird is bought with gold, and displays a fine sight with its
painted tail, as if that were anything to the purpose. "What; do you eat
that plumage, which you extol? or has the bird the same beauty when
dressed? " Since however there is no difference in the meat, in one
preferably to the other; it is manifest that you are imposed upon by the
disparity of their appearances. Be it so.
By what gift are you able to distinguish, whether this lupus, that now
opens its jaws before us, was taken in the Tiber, or in the sea? whether
it was tossed between the bridges or at the mouth of the Tuscan river?
Fool, you praise a mullet, that weighs three pounds; which you are
obliged to cut into small pieces. Outward appearances lead you, I see.
To what intent then do you contemn large lupuses? Because truly these
are by nature bulky, and those very light. A hungry stomach seldom
loathes common victuals. O that I could see a swingeing mullet extended
on a swingeing dish! cries that gullet, which is fit for the voracious
harpies themselves. But O [say I] ye southern blasts, be present to
taint the delicacies of the [gluttons]: though the boar and turbot
newly taken are rank, when surfeiting abundance provokes the sick
stomach; and when the sated guttler prefers turnips and sharp
elecampane. However, all [appearance of] poverty is not quite banished
from the banquets of our nobles; for there is, even at this day, a place
for paltry eggs and black olives. And it was not long ago, since the
table of Gallonius, the auctioneer, was rendered infamous, by having a
sturgeon, [served whole upon it]. What? was the sea at that time less
nutritive of turbots? The turbot was secure and the stork unmolested in
her nest; till the praetorian [Sempronius], the inventor, first taught
you [to eat them]. Therefore, if any one were to give it out that
roasted cormorants are delicious, the Roman youth, teachable in
depravity, would acquiesce, in it.
In the judgment of Ofellus, a sordid way of living will differ widely
from frugal simplicity. For it is to no purpose for you to shun that
vice [of luxury]; if you perversely fly to the contrary extreme.
Avidienus, to whom the nickname of Dog is applied with propriety, eats
olives of five years old, and wild cornels, and can not bear to rack off
his wine unless it be turned sour, and the smell of his oil you can not
endure: which (though clothed in white he celebrates the wedding
festival, his birthday, or any other festal days) he pours out himself
by little and little from a horn cruet, that holds two pounds, upon his
cabbage, [but at the same time] is lavish enough of his old vinegar.
What manner of living therefore shall the wise man put in practice, and
which of these examples shall he copy? On one side the wolf presses on,
and the dog on the other, as the saying is. A person will be accounted
decent, if he offends not by sordidness, and is not despicable through
either extreme of conduct. Such a man will not, after the example, of
old Albutius, be savage while he assigns to his servants their
respective offices; nor, like simple Naevius, will he offer greasy water
to his company: for this too is a great fault.
Now learn what and how great benefits a temperate diet will bring along
with it. In the first place, you will enjoy good health; for you may
believe how detrimental a diversity of things is to any man, when you
recollect that sort of food, which by its simplicity sat so well upon
your stomach some time ago. But, when you have once mixed boiled and
roast together, thrushes and shell-fish; the sweet juices will turn
into bile, and a thick phlegm will bring a jarring upon the stomach. Do
not you see, how pale each guest rises from a perplexing variety of
dishes at an entertainment. Beside this, the body, overloaded with the
debauch of yesterday, depresses the mind along with it, and dashes to
the earth that portion of the divine spirit. Another man, as soon as he
has taken a quick repast, and rendered up his limbs to repose, rises
vigorous to the duties of his calling. However, he may sometimes have
recourse to better cheer; whether the returning year shall bring on a
festival, or if he have a mind to refresh his impaired body; and when
years shall approach, and feeble age require to be used more tenderly.
But as for you, if a troublesome habit of body, or creeping old age,
should come upon you, what addition can be made to that soft indulgence,
which you, now in youth and in health anticipate?
Our ancestors praised a boar when it was stale not because they had no
noses; but with this view, I suppose, that a visitor coming later than
ordinary [might partake of it], though a little musty, rather than the
voracious master should devour it all himself while sweet. I wish that
the primitive earth had produced me among such heroes as these.
Have you any regard for reputation, which affects the human ear more
agreeably than music? Great turbots and dishes bring great disgrace
along with them, together with expense. Add to this, that your relations
and neighbors will be exasperated at you, while you will be at enmity
with yourself and desirous of death in vain, since you will not in your
poverty have three farthings left to purchase a rope withal. Trausius,
you say, may with justice be called to account in such language as this;
but I possess an ample revenue, and wealth sufficient for three
potentates, Why then have you no better method of expending your
superfluities? Why is any man, undeserving [of distressed
circumstances], in want, while you abound: How comes it to pass, that
the ancient temples of the gods are falling to ruin? Why do not you,
wretch that you are, bestow something on your dear country, out of so
vast a hoard? What, will matters always go well with you alone? O thou,
that hereafter shalt be the great derision of thine enemies! which of
the two shall depend upon himself in exigences with most certainty? He
who has used his mind and high-swollen body to redundancies; or he who,
contented with a little and provident for the future, like a Wise man
in time of peace, shall make the necessary preparations for war?
That you may the more readily give credit to these things: I myself,
when a little boy, took notice that this Ofellua did not use his
unencumbered estate more profusely, than he does now it is reduced. You
may see the sturdy husbandman laboring for hire in the land [once his
own, but now] assigned [to others], with his cattle and children,
talking to this effect; I never ventured to eat any thing on a work-day
except pot-herbs, with a hock of smoke-dried bacon. And when a friend
came to visit me after a long absence, or a neighbor, an acceptable
guest to me resting from work on account of the rain, we lived well; not
on fishes fetched from the city, but on a pullet and a kid: then a dried
grape, and a nut, with a large fig, set off our second course. After
this, it was our diversion to have no other regulation in our cups, save
that against drinking to excess; then Ceres worshiped [with a libation],
that the corn might arise in lofty stems, smoothed with wine the
melancholy of the contracted brow. Let fortune rage, and stir up new
tumults what can she do more to impair my estate? How much more savingly
have either I lived, or how much less neatly have you gone, my children,
since this new possessor came? For nature has appointed to be lord of
this earthly property, neither him, nor me, nor any one. He drove us
out: either iniquity or ignorance in the quirks of the law shall [do the
same] him: certainly in the end his long lived heir shall expel him. Now
this field under the denomination of Umbrenus', lately it was Ofellus',
the perpetual property of no man; for it turns to my use one while, and
by and by to that of another. Wherefore, live undaunted; and oppose
gallant breasts against the strokes of adversity.
* * * * *
SATIRE III.
_Damasippus, in a conversation with Horace, proves this paradox of the
Stoic philosophy, that most men are actually mad_.
You write so seldom, as not to call for parchment four times in the
year, busied in reforming your writings, yet are you angry with
yourself, that indulging in wine and sleep you produce nothing worthy to
be the subject of conversation. What will be the consequence? But you
took refuge here, it seems, at the very celebration of the Saturnalia,
out of sobriety.
Dictate therefore something worthy of your promises;
begin. There is nothing. The pens are found fault with to no purpose,
and the harmless wall, which must have been built under the displeasure
of gods and poets, suffers [to no end]. But you had the look of one that
had threatened many and excellent things, when once your villa had
received you, free from employment, under its warm roof. To what purpose
was it to stow Plato upon Menander? Eupolis, Archilochus? For what end
did you bring abroad such companions? What? are you setting about
appeasing envy by deserting virtue? Wretch, you will be despised. That
guilty Siren, Sloth, must be avoided; or whatever acquisitions you have
made in the better part of your life, must with equanimity be given up.
May the gods and godnesses, O Damasippus, present you with a barber for
your sound advice! But by what means did you get so well acquainted with
me? Since all my fortunes were dissipated at the middle of the exchange,
detached from all business of my own, I mind that of other people. For
formerly I used to take a delight in inquiring, in what vase the crafty
Sisyphus might have washed his feet; what was carved in an unworkmanlike
manner, and what more roughly cast than it ought to be; being a
connoisseur, I offered a hundred thousand sesterces for such a statue; I
was the only man who knew how to purchase gardens and fine seats to the
best advantage: whence the crowded ways gave me the surname of
Mercurial. I know it well; and am amazed at your being cured of that
disorder. Why a new disorder expelled the old one in a marvelous manner;
as it is accustomed to do, when the pain of the afflicted side, or the
head, is turned upon the stomach; as it is with a man in a lethargy,
when he turns boxer, and attacks his physician. As long as you do
nothing like this, be it even as you please. O my good friend, do not
deceive yourself; you likewise are mad, and it is almost "fools all," if
what Stertinius insists upon has any truth in it; from whom, being of a
teachable disposition, I derived these admirable precepts, at the very
time when, having given me consolation, he ordered me to cultivate a
philosophical beard, and to return cheerfully from the Fabrician bridge.
For when, my affairs being desperate, I had a mind to throw myself into
the river, having covered my head [for that purpose], he fortunately was
at my elbow; and [addressed me to this effect]: Take care, how do any
thing unworthy of yourself; a false shame, says he, afflicts you, who
dread to be esteemed a madman among madmen. For in the first place, I
will inquire, what it is to be mad: and, if this distemper be in you
exclusively, I will not add a single word, to prevent you from dying
bravely.
The school and sect of Chrysippus deem every man mad, whom vicious folly
or the ignorance of truth drives blindly forward. This definition takes
in whole nations, this even great kings, the wise man [alone] excepted.
Now learn, why all those, who have fixed the name of madman upon you,
are as senseless as yourself. As in the woods, where a mistake makes
people wander about from the proper path; one goes out of the way to the
right, another to the left; there is the same blunder on both sides,
only the illusion is in different directions: in this manner imagine
yourself mad; so that he, who derides you, hangs his tail not one jot
wiser than yourself. There is one species of folly, that dreads things
not in the least formidable; insomuch that it will complain of fires,
and rocks, and rivers opposing it in the open plain; there is another
different from this, but not a whit more approaching to wisdom, that
runs headlong through the midst of flames and floods. Let the loving
mother, the virtuous sister, the father, the wife, together with all the
relations [of a man possessed with this latter folly], cry out: "Here is
a deep ditch; here is a prodigious rock; take care of yourself:" he
would give no more attention, than did the drunken Fufius some time ago,
when he overslept the character of Ilione, twelve hundred Catieni at the
same time roaring out, _O mother, I call you to my aid_. I will
demonstrate to you, that the generality of all mankind are mad in the
commission of some folly similar to this.
Damasippus is mad for purchasing antique statues: but is Damasippus'
creditor in his senses? Well, suppose I should say to you: receive this,
which you can never repay: will you be a madman, if you receive it; or
would you be more absurd for rejecting a booty, which propitious Mercury
offers? Take bond, like the banker Nerius, for ten thousand sesterces;
it will not signify: add the forms of Cicuta, so versed in the knotty
points of law: add a thousand obligations: yet this wicked Proteus will
evade all these ties. When you shall drag him to justice, laughing as if
his cheeks were none of his own; he will be transformed into a boar,
sometimes into a bird, sometimes into a stone, and when he pleases Into
a tree. If to conduct one's affairs badly be the part of a madman; and
the reverse, that of a man well in his senses; brain of Perillius
(believe me), who orders you [that sum of money], which you can never
repay, is much more unsound [than yours].
Whoever grows pale with evil ambition, or the love of money: whoever is
heated with luxury, or gloomy superstition, or any other disease of the
mind, I command him to adjust his garment and attend: hither, all of ye,
come near me in order, while I convince you that you are mad.
By far the largest portion of hellebore is to be administered to the
covetous: I know not, whether reason does not consign all Anticyra to
their use. The heirs of Staberius engraved the sum [which he left them]
upon his tomb: unless they had acted in this manner, they were under an
obligation to exhibit a hundred pair of gladiators to the people, beside
an entertainment according to the direction of Arrius; and as much corn
as is cut in Africa. Whether I have willed this rightly or wrongly, it
was my will; be not severe against me, [cries the testator]. I imagine
the provident mind of Staberius foresaw this. What then did he moan,
when he appointed by will that his heirs should engrave the sum of their
patrimony upon his tomb-stone? As long as he lived, he deemed poverty a
great vice, and nothing did he more industriously avoid: insomuch that,
had he died less rich by one farthing, the more Iniquitous would he have
appeared to himself. For every thing, virtue, fame, glory, divine and
human affairs, are subservient to the attraction of riches; which
whoever shall have accumulated, shall be illustrious, brave, just--What,
wise too? Ay, and a king, and whatever else he pleases. This he was in
hopes would greatly redound to his praise, as if it had been an
acquisition of his virtue. In what respect did the Grecian Aristippus
act like this; who ordered his slaves to throw away his gold in the
midst of Libya; because, encumbered with the burden, they traveled too
slowly? Which is the greater madman of these two? An example is nothing
to the purpose, that decides one controversy by creating another. If any
person were to buy lyres, and [when he had bought them] to stow them in
one place; though neither addicted to the lyre nor to any one muse
whatsoever: if a man were [to buy] paring-knives and lasts, and were no
shoemaker; sails fit for navigation, and were averse to merchandizing;
he every where deservedly be styled delirious, and out of his senses.
How does he differ from these, who boards up cash and gold [and] knows
not how to use them when accumulated, and is afraid to touch them as if
they were consecrated? If any person before a great heap of corn should
keep perpetual watch with a long club, and, though the owner of it, and
hungry, should not dare to take a single grain from it; and should
rather feed upon bitter leaves: if while a thousand hogsheads of Chian,
or old Falernian, is stored up within (nay, that is nothing--three
hundred thousand), he drink nothing, but what is mere sharp vinegars
again--if, wanting but one year of eighty, he should lie upon straw, who
has bed-clothes rotting in his chest, the food of worms and moths; he
would seem mad, belike, but to few persons: because the greatest part of
mankind labors, under the same malady.
Thou dotard, hateful to the gods, dost thou guard [these possessions],
for fear of wanting thyself: to the end that thy son, or even the
freedman thy heir, should guzzle it all up? For how little will each day
deduct from your capital, if you begin to pour better oil upon your
greens and your head, filthy with scurf not combed out? If any thing be
a sufficiency, wherefore are you guilty of perjury [wherefore] do you
rob, and plunder from all quarters? Are you in your senses? If you were
to begin to pelt the populace with stones, and the slaves, which you
purchased with your money; all the: very boys and girls will cry out
that you are a madman. When you dispatch your wife with a rope, and your
mother with poison, are you right in your head? Why not? You neither did
this at Argos, nor slew your mother with the sword, as the mad Orestes
did. What, do you imagine that he ran? mad after he had murdered his
parent; and that he was not driven mad by the wicked Furies, before he
warmed his sharp steel in his mother's throat? Nay, from the time that
Orestes is deemed to have been of a dangerous disposition, he did
nothing in fact that you can blame; he did not dare to offer violence
with his sword to Pylades, nor to his sister Electra; he only gave ill
language to both of them, by calling her a Fury, and him some other
[opprobrious name], which, his violent choler suggested.
Opimius, poor amid silver and gold hoarded up within, who used to drink
out of Campanian ware Veientine wine on holidays, and mere dregs on
common days, was some time ago taken with a prodigious lethargy;
insomuch that his heir was already scouring about his coffers and keys,
in joy and triumph. His physician, a man of much dispatch and fidelity,
raises him in this manner: he orders a table to be brought, and the bags
of money to be poured out, and several persons to approach in order to
count it: by this method he sets the man upon his legs again. And at the
same time he addresses him to this effect. Unless you guard your money
your ravenous heir will even now carry off these [treasures] of yours.
What, while I am alive? That you may live, therefore, awake; do this.
What would you have me do? Why your blood will fail you that are so much
reduced, unless food and some great restorative be administered to your
decaying stomach. Do you hesitate? come on; take this ptisan made of
rice. How much did it cost? A trifle. How much then? Eight asses. Alas!
what does it matter, whether I die of a disease, or by theft and rapine?
Who then is sound? He, who is not a fool. What is the covetous man? Both
a fool and a madman. What--if a man be not covetous, is he immediately
[to be deemed] sound? By no means. Why so, Stoic? I will tell you. Such
a patient (suppose Craterus [the physician] said this) is not sick at
the heart. Is he therefore well, and shall he get up? No, he will forbid
that; because his side or his reins are harassed with an acute disease.
[In like manner], such a man is not perjured, nor sordid; let him then
sacrifice a hog to his propitious household gods. But he is ambitious
and assuming. Let him make a voyage [then] to Anticyra. For what is the
difference, whether you fling whatever you have into a gulf, or make no
use of your acquisitions?
Servius Oppidius, rich in the possession of an ancient estate, is
reported when dying to have divided two farms at Canusium between his
two sons, and to have addressed the boys, called to his bed-side, [in
the following manner]: When I saw you, Aulus, carry your playthings and
nuts carelessly in your bosom, [and] to give them and game them away;
you, Tiberius, count them, and anxious hide them in holes; I was afraid
lest a madness of a different nature should possess you: lest you
[Aulus], should follow the example of Nomentanus, you, [Tiberius], that
of Cicuta. Wherefore each of you, entreated by our household gods, do
you (Aulus) take care lest you lessen; you (Tiberius) lest you make that
greater, which your father thinks and the purposes of nature determine
to be sufficient. Further, lest glory should entice you, I will bind
each of you by an oath: whichever of you shall be an aedile or a
praetor, let him be excommunicated and accursed. Would you destroy your
effects in [largesses of] peas, beans, and lupines, that you may stalk
in the circus at large, or stand in a statue of brass, O madman,
stripped of your paternal estate, stripped of your money? To the end,
forsooth, that you may gain those applauses, which Agrippa gains, like a
cunning fox imitating a generous lion?
O Agamemnon, why do you prohibit any one from burying Ajax? I am a king.
I, a plebeian, make no further inquiry. And I command a just thing: but,
if I seem unjust to any one, I permit you to speak your sentiments with
impunity. Greatest of kings, may the gods grant that, after the taking
of Troy, you may conduct your fleet safe home: may I then have the
liberty to ask questions, and reply in my turn? Ask. Why does Ajax, the
second hero after Achilles, rot [above ground], so often renowned for
having saved the Grecians; that Priam and Priam's people may exult in
his being unburied, by whose means so many youths have been deprived of
their country's rites of sepulture. In his madness he killed a thousand
sheep, crying out that he was destroying the famous Ulysses and
Menelaus, together with me. When you at Aulis substituted your sweet
daughter in the place of a heifer before the altar, and, O impious one,
sprinkled her head with the salt cake; did you preserve soundness of
mind? Why do you ask? What then did the mad Ajax do, when he slew the
flock with his sword? He abstained from any violence to his wife and
child, though he had imprecated many curses on the sons of Atreus: he
neither hurt Teucer, nor even Ulysses himself. But I, out of prudence,
appeased the gods with blood, that I might loose the ships detained on
an adverse shore. Yes, madman! with your own blood. With my own
[indeed], but I was not mad. Whoever shall form images foreign from
reality, and confused in the tumult of impiety, will always be reckoned
disturbed in mind: and it will not matter, whether he go wrong through
folly or through rage. Is Ajax delirious, while he kills the harmless
lambs? Are you right in your head, when you willfully commit a crime for
empty titles? And is your heart pure, while it is swollen with the vice?
If any person should take a delight to carry about with him in his sedan
a pretty lambkin; and should provide clothes, should provide maids and
gold for it, as for a daughter, should call it Rufa and Rufilla, and
should destine it a wife for some stout husband; the praetor would
take power from him being interdicted, and the management of him would
devolve to his relations, that were in their senses. What, if a man
devote his daughter instead of a dumb lambkin, is he right of mind?
Never say it. Therefore, wherever there is a foolish depravity, there
will be the height of madness. He who is wicked, will be frantic too:
Bellona, who delights in bloodshed, has thundered about him, whom
precarious fame has captivated.
Now, come on, arraign with me luxury and Nomentanus; for reason will
evince that foolish spendthrifts are mad. This fellow, as soon as he
received a thousand talents of patrimony, issues an order that the
fishmonger, the fruiterer, the poulterer, the perfumer, and the impious
gang of the Tuscan alley, sausage-maker, and buffoons, the whole
shambles, together with [all] Velabrum, should come to his house in the
morning. What was the consequence? They came in crowds. The pander makes
a speech: "Whatever I, or whatever each of these has at home, believe it
to be yours: and give your order for it either directly, or to-morrow. "
Hear what reply the considerate youth made: "You sleep booted in
Lucanian snow, that I may feast on a boar: you sweep the wintry seas for
fish: I am indolent, and unworthy to possess so much. Away with it: do
you take for your share ten hundred thousand sesterces; you as much; you
thrice the sum, from whose house your spouse runs, when called for, at
midnight. " The son of Aesopus, [the actor] (that he might, forsooth,
swallow a million of sesterces at a draught), dissolved in vinegar a
precious pearl, which he had taken from the ear of Metella: how much
wiser was he [in doing this,] than if he had thrown the same into a
rapid river, or the common sewer? The progeny of Quintius Arrius, an
illustrious pair of brothers, twins in wickedness and trifling and the
love of depravity, used to dine upon nightingales bought at a vast
expense: to whom do these belong? Are they in their senses? Are they to
be marked With chalk, or with charcoal?
If an [aged person] with a long beard should take a delight to build
baby-houses, to yoke mice to a go-cart, to play at odd and even, to ride
upon a long cane, madness must be his motive. If reason shall evince,
that to be in love is a more childish thing than these; and that there
is no difference whether you play the same games in the dust as when
three years old, or whine in anxiety for the love of a harlot: I beg to
know, if you will act as the reformed Polemon did of old? Will you lay
aside those ensigns of your disease, your rollers, your mantle, your
mufflers; as he in his cups is said to have privately torn the chaplet
from his neck, after he was corrected by the speech of his fasting
master? When you offer apples to an angry boy, he refuses them: here,
take them, you little dog; he denies you: if you don't give them, he
wants them. In what does an excluded lover differ [from such a boy];
when he argues with himself whether he should go or not to that very
place whither he was returning without being sent for, and cleaves to
the hated doors? "What shall I not go to her now, when she invites me of
her own accord? or shall I rather think of putting an end to my pains?
She has excluded me; she recalls me: shall I return? No, not if she
would implore me. " Observe the servant, not a little wiser: "O master,
that which has neither moderation nor conduct, can not be guided by
reason or method. In love these evils are inherent; war [one while],
then peace again. If any one should endeavor to ascertain these things,
that are various as the weather, and fluctuating by blind chance; he
will make no more of it, than if he should set about raving by right
reason and rule. " What--when, picking the pippins from the Picenian
apples, you rejoice if haply you have hit the vaulted roof; are you
yourself? What--when you strike out faltering accents from your
antiquated palate, how much wiser are you than [a child] that builds
little houses? To the folly [of love] add bloodshed, and stir the fire
with a sword. I ask you, when Marius lately, after he had stabbed
Hellas, threw himself down a precipice, was he raving mad? Or will you
absolve the man from the imputation of a disturbed mind, and condemn him
for the crime, according to your custom, imposing, on things named that
have an affinity in signification?
There was a certain freedman, who, an old man, ran about the streets in
a morning fasting, with his hands washed, and prayed thus: "Snatch me
alone from death" (adding some solemn vow), "me alone, for it is an easy
matter for the gods:" this man was sound in both his ears and eyes; but
his master, when he sold him, would except his understanding, unless he
were fond of law-suits. This crowd too Chrysippus places in the fruitful
family of Menenius.
O Jupiter, who givest and takest away great afflictions, (cries the
mother of a boy, now lying sick abed for five months), if this cold
quartan ague should leave the child, in the morning of that day on which
you enjoy a fast, he shall stand naked in the Tiber. Should chance or
the physician relieve the patient from his imminent danger, the
infatuated mother will destroy [the boy] placed on the cold bank, and
will bring back the fever. With what disorder of the mind is she
stricken? Why, with a superstitious fear of the gods.
These arms Stertinius, the eighth of the wise men, gave to me, as to a
friend, that for the future I might not be roughly accosted without
avenging myself. Whosoever shall call me madman, shall hear as much from
me [in return]; and shall learn to look back upon the bag that hangs
behind him.
O Stoic, so may you, after your damage, sell all your merchandise the
better: what folly (for, [it seems,] there are more kinds than one) do
you think I am infatuated with? For to myself I seem sound. What--when
mad Agave carries the amputated head of her unhappy son, does she then
seem mad to herself? I allow myself a fool (let me yield to the truth)
and a madman likewise: only declare this, with what distemper of mind
you think me afflicted. Hear, then: in the first place you build; that
is, though from top to bottom you are but of the two-foot size you
imitate the tall: and you, the same person, laugh at the spirit and
strut of Turbo in armor, too great for his [little] body: how are you
less ridiculous than him? What--is it fitting that, in every thing
Maecenas does, you, who are so very much unlike him and so much his
inferior, should vie with him? The young ones of a frog being in her
absence crushed by the foot of a calf, when one of them had made his
escape, he told his mother what a huge beast had dashed his brethren to
pieces. She began to ask, how big? Whether it were so great? puffing
herself up. Greater by half. What, so big? when she had swelled herself
more and more. If you should burst yourself, says he, you will not be
equal to it. This image bears no great dissimilitude to you. Now add
poems (that is, add oil to the fire), which if ever any man in his
senses made, why so do you. I do not mention your horrid rage. At
length, have done--your way of living beyond your fortune--confine
yourself to your own affairs, Damasippus--those thousand passions for
the fair, the young. Thou greater madman, at last, spare thy inferior.
* * * * *
SATIRE IV.
_He ridicules the absurdity of one Catius, who placed the summit of
human felicity in the culinary art_.
Whence, and whither, Catius? I have not time [to converse with you],
being desirous of impressing on my memory some new precepts; such as
excel Pythagoras, and him that was accused by Anytus, and the learned
Plato. I acknowledge my offense, since I have interrupted you at so
unlucky a juncture: but grant me your pardon, good sir, I beseech you.
If any thing should have slipped you now, you will presently recollect
it: whether this talent of yours be of nature, or of art, you are
amazing in both. Nay, but I was anxious, how I might retain all [these
precepts]; as being things of a delicate nature, and in a delicate
style. Tell me the name of this man; and at the same time whether he is
a Roman, or a foreigner? As I have them by heart, I will recite the
precepts: the author shall be concealed.
Remember to serve up those eggs that are of an oblong make, as being of
sweeter flavor and more nutritive than the round ones: for, being
tough-shelled, they contain a male yelk. Cabbage that grows in dry
lands, is sweeter than that about town: nothing is more insipid than a
garden much watered. If a visitor should come unexpectedly upon you in
the evening, lest the tough old hen prove disagreeable to his palate,
you must learn to drown it in Falernian wine mixed [with water]: this
will make it tender. The mushrooms that grow in meadows, are of the best
kind: all others are dangerously trusted. That man shall spend his
summers healthy who shall finish his dinners with mulberries black [with
ripeness], which he shall have gathered from the tree before the sun
becomes violent. Aufidius used to mix honey with strong Falernian
injudiciously; because it is right to commit nothing to the empty veins,
but what is emollient: you will, with more propriety, wash your stomach
with soft mead. If your belly should be hard bound, the limpet and
coarse cockles will remove obstructions, and leaves of the small sorrel;
but not without Coan white wine. The increasing moons swell the
lubricating shell-fish. But every sea is not productive of the exquisite
sorts. The Lucrine muscle is better than the Baian murex: [The best]
oysters come from the Circaean promontory; cray-fish from Misenum: the
soft Tarentum plumes herself on her broad escalops. Let no one
presumptuously arrogate to himself the science of banqueting, unless the
nice doctrine of tastes has been previously considered by him with exact
system. Nor is it enough to sweep away a parcel of fishes from the
expensive stalls, [while he remains] ignorant for what sort stewed sauce
is more proper, and what being roasted, the sated guest will presently
replace himself on his elbow. Let the boar from Umbria, and that which
has been fed with the acorns of the scarlet oak, bend the round dishes
of him who dislikes all flabby meat: for the Laurentian boar, fattened
with flags and reeds, is bad. The vineyard does not always afford the
most eatable kids. A man of sense will be fond of the shoulders of a
pregnant hare. What is the proper age and nature of fish and fowl,
though inquired after, was never discovered before my palate.
able to stand it out, or have any knowledge of the civil laws: and
besides, I am in a hurry, you know whither. " "I am in doubt what I shall
do," said he; "whether desert you or my cause. " "Me, I beg of you. " "I
will not do it," said he; and began to take the lead of me. I (as it is
difficult to contend with one's master) follow him. "How stands it with
Maecenas and you? " Thus he begins his prate again. "He is one of few
intimates, and of a very wise way of thinking. No man ever made use of
opportunity with more cleverness. You should have a powerful assistant,
who could play an underpart, if you were disposed to recommend this man;
may I perish, if you should not supplant all the rest! " "We do not live
there in the manner you imagine; there is not a house that is freer or
more remote from evils of this nature. It is never of any disservice to
me, that any particular person is wealthier or a better scholar than I
am: every individual has his proper place. " "You tell me a marvelous
thing, scarcely credible. " "But it is even so. " "You the more inflame my
desires to be near his person. " "You need only be inclined to it: such
is your merit, you will accomplish it: and he is capable of being won;
and on that account the first access to him he makes difficult. " "I will
not be wanting to myself: I will corrupt his servants with presents; if
I am excluded to-day, I will not desist; I will seek opportunities; I
will meet him in the public streets; I will wait upon him home. Life
allows nothing to mortals without great labor. " While he was running on
at this rate, lo! Fuscus Aristius comes up, a dear friend of mine, and
one who knows the fellow well. We make a stop. "Whence come you? whither
are you going? " he asks and answers. I began to twitch him [by the
elbow], and to take hold of his arms [that were affectedly] passive,
nodding and distorting my eyes, that he might rescue me. Cruelly arch
he laughs, and pretends not to take the hint: anger galled my liver.
"Certainly," [said I, "Fuscus,] you said that you wanted to communicate
something to me in private. " "I remember it very well; but will tell it
you at a better opportunity: to-day is the thirtieth sabbath. Would you
affront the circumcised Jews? " I reply, "I have no scruple [on that
account]. " "But I have: I am something weaker, one of the multitude. You
must forgive me: I will speak with you on another occasion. " And has
this sun arisen so disastrous upon me! The wicked rogue runs away, and
leaves me under the knife. But by luck his adversary met him: and,
"Whither are you going, you infamous fellow? " roars he with a loud
voice: and, "Do you witness the arrest? " I assent. He hurries him into
court: there is a great clamor on both sides, a mob from all parts. Thus
Apollo preserved me.
* * * * *
SATIRE X.
_He supports the judgment which he had before given of Lucilius, and
intersperses some excellent precepts for the writing of Satire. _
To be sure I did say, that the verses of Lucilius did not run smoothly.
Who is so foolish an admirer of Lucilius, that he would not own this?
But the same writer is applauded in the same Satire, on account of his
having lashed the town with great humor. Nevertheless granting him this,
I will not therefore give up the other [considerations]; for at that
rate I might even admire the farces of Laberius, as fine poems. Hence it
is by no means sufficient to make an auditor grim with laughter: and yet
there is some degree of merit even in this. There is need of conciseness
that the sentence may run, and not embarrass itself with verbiage, that
overloads the sated ear; and sometimes a grave, frequently jocose style
is necessary, supporting the character one while of the orator and [at
another] of the poet, now and then that of a graceful rallier that curbs
the force of his pleasantry and weakens it on purpose. For ridicule
often decides matters of importance more effectually and in a better
manner, than severity. Those poets by whom the ancient comedy was
written, stood upon this [foundation], and in this are they worthy of
imitation: whom neither the smooth-faced Hermogenes ever read, nor that
baboon who is skilled in nothing but singing [the wanton compositions
of] Calvus and Catullus.
But [Lucilius, say they,] did a great thing, when he intermixed Greek
words with Latin. O late-learned dunces! What! do you think that arduous
and admirable, which was done by Pitholeo the Rhodian? But [still they
cry] the style elegantly composed of both tongues is the more pleasant,
as if Falernian wine is mixed with Chian. When you make verses, I ask
you this question; were you to undertake the difficult cause of the
accused Petillius, would you (for instance), forgetful of your country
and your father, while Pedius, Poplicola, and Corvinus sweat through
their causes in Latin, choose to intermix words borrowed from abroad,
like the double-tongued Canusinian. And as for myself, who was born on
this side the water, when I was about making Greek verses; Romulus
appearing to me after midnight, when dreams are true, forbade me in
words to this effect; "You could not be guilty of more madness by
carrying timber into a wood, than by desiring to throng in among the
great crowds of Grecian writers. "
While bombastical Alpinus murders Memnon, and while he deforms the muddy
source of the Rhine, I amuse myself with these satires; which can
neither be recited in the temple [of Apollo], as contesting for the
prize when Tarpa presides as judge, nor can have a run over and over
again represented in the theatres. You, O Fundanius, of all men
breathing are the most capable of prattling tales in a comic vein, how
an artful courtesan and a Davus impose upon an old Chremes. Pollio sings
the actions of kings in iambic measure; the sublime Varias composes the
manly epic, in a manner that no one can equal: to Virgil the Muses,
delighting in rural scenes, have granted the delicate and the elegant.
It was this kind [of satiric writing], the Aticinian Varro and some
others having attempted it without success, in which I may have some
slight merit, inferior to the inventor: nor would I presume to pull off
the [laurel] crown placed upon his brow with great applause.
But I said that he flowed muddily, frequently indeed bearing along more
things which ought to be taken away than left. Be it so; do you, who are
a scholar, find no fault with any thing in mighty Homer, I pray? Does
the facetious Lucilius make no alterations in the tragedies of Accius?
Does not he ridicule many of Ennius' verses, which are too light for
the gravity [of the subject]? When he speaks of himself by no means as
superior to what he blames. What should hinder me likewise, when I am
reading the works of Lucilius, from inquiring whether it be his
[genius], or the difficult nature of his subject, that will not suffer
his verses to be more finished, and to run more smoothly than if some
one, thinking it sufficient to conclude a something of six feet, be fond
of writing two hundred verses before he eats, and as many after supper?
Such was the genius of the Tuscan Cassius, more impetuous than a rapid
river; who, as it is reported, was burned [at the funeral pile] with his
own books and papers. Let it be allowed, I say, that Lucilius was a
humorous and polite writer; that he was also more correct than [Ennius],
the author of a kind of poetry [not yet] well cultivated, nor attempted
by the Greeks, and [more correct likewise] than the tribe of our old
poets: but yet he, if he had been brought down by the Fates to this age
of ours, would have retrenched a great deal from his writings: he would
have pruned off every thing that transgressed the limits of perfection;
and, in the composition of verses, would often have scratched his head,
and bit his nails to the quick.
You that intend to write what is worthy to be read more than once, blot
frequently: and take no-pains to make the multitude admire you, content
with a few [judicious] readers. What, would you be such a fool as to be
ambitious that your verses should be taught in petty schools? That is
not my case. It is enough for me, that the knight [Maecenas] applauds:
as the courageous actress, Arbuscula, expressed herself, in contempt of
the rest of the audience, when she was hissed [by the populace]. What,
shall that grubworm Pantilius have any effect upon me? Or can it vex me,
that Demetrius carps at me behind my back? or because the trifler
Fannius, that hanger-on to Hermogenes Tigellius, attempts to hurt me?
May Plotius and Varius, Maecenas and Virgil, Valgius and Octavius
approve these Satires, and the excellent Fuscus likewise; and I could
wish that both the Visci would join in their commendations: ambition
apart, I may mention you, O Pollio: you also, Messala, together with
your brother; and at the same time, you, Bibulus and Servius; and along
with these you, candid Furnius; many others whom, though men of learning
and my friends, I purposely omit--to whom I would wish these Satires,
such as they are, may give satisfaction; and I should be chagrined, if
they pleased in a degree below my expectation. You, Demetrius, and you,
Tigellius, I bid lament among the forms of your female pupils.
Go, boy, and instantly annex this Satire to the end of my book.
* * * * *
THE SECOND BOOK OF THE SATIRES OF HORACE.
SATIRE I.
_He supposes himself to consult with Trebatius, whether he should desist
from writing satires, or not_.
There are some persons to whom I seem too severe in [the writing of]
satire, and to carry it beyond proper bounds: another set are of
opinion, that all I have written is nerveless, and that a thousand
verses like mine may be spun out in a day. Trebatius, give me your
advice, what shall I do. Be quiet. I should not make, you say, verses at
all. I do say so. May I be hanged, if that would not be best: but I can
not sleep. Let those, who want sound sleep, anointed swim thrice across
the Tiber: and have their clay well moistened with wine over-night. Or,
if such a great love of scribbling hurries you on, venture to celebrate
the achievements of the invincible Caesar, certain of bearing off ample
rewards for your pains.
Desirous I am, my good father, [to do this,] but my strength fails me,
nor can any one describe the troops bristled with spears, nor the Gauls
dying on their shivered darts, nor the wounded Parthian falling from his
horse. Nevertheless you may describe him just and brave, as the wise
Lucilius did Scipio. I will not be wanting to myself, when an
opportunity presents itself: no verses of Horace's, unless well-timed,
will gain the attention of Caesar; whom, [like a generous steed,] if you
stroke awkwardly, he will kick upon you, being at all quarters on his
guard. How much better would this be, than to wound with severe satire
Pantolabus the buffoon, and the rake Nomentanus! when every body is
afraid for himself, [lest he should be the next,] and hates you, though
he is not meddled with. What shall I do? Milonius falls a dancing the
moment he becomes light-headed and warm, and the candles appear
multiplied. Castor delights in horsemanship: and he, who sprang from the
same egg, in boxing. As many thousands of people [as there are in the
world], so many different inclinations are there. It delights me to
combine words in meter, after the manner of Lucilius, a better man than
both of us. He long ago communicated his secrets to his books, as to
faithful friends; never having recourse elsewhere, whether things went
well or ill with him: whence it happens, that the whole life of this old
[poet] is as open to the view, as if it had been painted en a votive
tablet. His example I follow, though in doubt whether I am a Lucanian or
an Apulian; for the Venusinian farmers plow upon the boundaries of both
countries, who (as the ancient tradition has it) were sent, on the
expulsion of the Samnites, for this purpose, that the enemy might not
make incursions on the Romans, through a vacant [unguarded frontier]: or
lest the Apulian nation, or the fierce Lucanian, should make an
invasion. But this pen of mine shall not willfully attack any man
breathing, and shall defend me like a sword that is sheathed in the
scabbard which why should I attempt to draw, [while I am] safe from
hostile villains? O Jupiter, father and sovereign, may my weapon laid
aside wear away with rust, and may no one injure me, who am desirous of
peace? But that man shall provoke me (I give notice, that it is better
not to touch me) shall weep [his folly], and as a notorious character
shall be sung through all the streets of Rome.
Cervius, when he is offended, threatens one with the laws and the
[judiciary] urn; Canidia, Albutius' poison to those with whom she is at
enmity, Turius [threatens] great damages, if you contest any thing while
he is judge. How every animal terrifies those whom he suspects, with
that in which he is most powerful, and how strong natural instinct
commands this, thus infer with me. --The wolf attacks with his teeth, the
bull with his horns. From what principle is this, if not a suggestion
from within? Intrust that debauchee Scaeva with the custody of his
ancient mother; his pious hand will commit no outrage. A wonder indeed!
just as the wolf does not attack any one with his hoof, nor the bull
with his teeth; but the deadly hemlock in the poisoned honey will take
off the old dame.
That I may not be tedious, whether a placid old age awaits me, or
whether death now hovers about me with his sable wings; rich or poor, at
Rome or (if fortune should so order it) an exile abroad; whatever be the
complexion of my life, I will write. O my child, I fear you can not be
long, lived; and that some creature of the great ones will strike you
with the cold of death. What? when Lucilius had the courage to be the
first in composing verses after this manner, and to pull off that mask,
by means of which each man strutted in public view with a fair outside,
though foul within; was Laelius, and he who derived a well deserved
title from the destruction of Carthage, offended at his wit, or were
they hurt at Metellus being lashed, or Lupus covered over with his
lampoons? But he took to task the heads of the people, and the people
themselves, class by class; in short, he spared none but virtue and her
friends. Yet, when the valorous Scipio, and the mild philosophical
Laelius, had withdrawn themselves from the crowd and the public scene,
they used to divert themselves with him, and joke in a free manner,
while a few vegetables were boiled [for supper]. Of whatever rank I am,
though below the estate and wit of Lucilius, yet envy must be obliged to
own that I have lived well with great men; and, wanting to fasten her
tooth upon some weak part, will strike it against the solid: unless you,
learned Trebatius, disapprove of any thing [I have said]. For my part, I
can not make any objection to this. But however, that forewarned you may
be upon your guard, lest in ignorance of our sacred laws should bring
you into trouble, [be sure of this] if any person shall make scandalous
verses against a particular man, an action lies, and a sentence.
Granted, if they are scandalous: but if a man composes good ones, and is
praised by such a judge as Caesar? If a man barks only at him who
deserves his invectives, while he himself is unblamable? The process
will be canceled with laughter: and you, being dismissed, may depart in
peace.
* * * * *
SATIRE II.
_On Frugality_.
What and how great is the virtue to live on a little (this is no
doctrine of mine, but what Ofellus the peasant, a philosopher without
rules and of a home-spun wit, taught me), learn, my good friends, not
among dishes and splendid tables; when the eye is dazzled with the vain
glare, and the mind, intent upon false appearances, refuses [to admit]
better things; but here, before dinner, discuss this point with me. Why
so? I will inform you, if I can. Every corrupted judge examines badly
the truth. After hunting the hare, or being wearied by an unruly horse,
or (if the Roman exercise fatigues you, accustomed to act the Greek)
whether the swift ball, while eagerness softens and prevents your
perceiving the severity of the game, or quoits (smite the yielding air
with the quoit) when exercise has worked of squeamishness, dry and
hungry, [then let me see you] despise mean viands; and don't drink
anything but Hymettian honey qualified with Falernian wine. Your butler
is abroad, and the tempestuous sea preserves the fish by its wintery
storms; bread and salt will sufficiently appease an importunate stomach.
Whence do you think this happens? and how is it obtained? The consummate
pleasure is not in the costly flavor, but in yourself. Do you seek for
sauce by sweating. Neither oysters, nor scar, nor the far-fetched
lagois, can give any pleasure to one bloated and pale through
intemperance. Nevertheless, if a peacock were served up, I should hardly
be able to prevent your gratifying the palate with that, rather than a
pullet, since you are prejudiced by the vanities of things; because the
scarce bird is bought with gold, and displays a fine sight with its
painted tail, as if that were anything to the purpose. "What; do you eat
that plumage, which you extol? or has the bird the same beauty when
dressed? " Since however there is no difference in the meat, in one
preferably to the other; it is manifest that you are imposed upon by the
disparity of their appearances. Be it so.
By what gift are you able to distinguish, whether this lupus, that now
opens its jaws before us, was taken in the Tiber, or in the sea? whether
it was tossed between the bridges or at the mouth of the Tuscan river?
Fool, you praise a mullet, that weighs three pounds; which you are
obliged to cut into small pieces. Outward appearances lead you, I see.
To what intent then do you contemn large lupuses? Because truly these
are by nature bulky, and those very light. A hungry stomach seldom
loathes common victuals. O that I could see a swingeing mullet extended
on a swingeing dish! cries that gullet, which is fit for the voracious
harpies themselves. But O [say I] ye southern blasts, be present to
taint the delicacies of the [gluttons]: though the boar and turbot
newly taken are rank, when surfeiting abundance provokes the sick
stomach; and when the sated guttler prefers turnips and sharp
elecampane. However, all [appearance of] poverty is not quite banished
from the banquets of our nobles; for there is, even at this day, a place
for paltry eggs and black olives. And it was not long ago, since the
table of Gallonius, the auctioneer, was rendered infamous, by having a
sturgeon, [served whole upon it]. What? was the sea at that time less
nutritive of turbots? The turbot was secure and the stork unmolested in
her nest; till the praetorian [Sempronius], the inventor, first taught
you [to eat them]. Therefore, if any one were to give it out that
roasted cormorants are delicious, the Roman youth, teachable in
depravity, would acquiesce, in it.
In the judgment of Ofellus, a sordid way of living will differ widely
from frugal simplicity. For it is to no purpose for you to shun that
vice [of luxury]; if you perversely fly to the contrary extreme.
Avidienus, to whom the nickname of Dog is applied with propriety, eats
olives of five years old, and wild cornels, and can not bear to rack off
his wine unless it be turned sour, and the smell of his oil you can not
endure: which (though clothed in white he celebrates the wedding
festival, his birthday, or any other festal days) he pours out himself
by little and little from a horn cruet, that holds two pounds, upon his
cabbage, [but at the same time] is lavish enough of his old vinegar.
What manner of living therefore shall the wise man put in practice, and
which of these examples shall he copy? On one side the wolf presses on,
and the dog on the other, as the saying is. A person will be accounted
decent, if he offends not by sordidness, and is not despicable through
either extreme of conduct. Such a man will not, after the example, of
old Albutius, be savage while he assigns to his servants their
respective offices; nor, like simple Naevius, will he offer greasy water
to his company: for this too is a great fault.
Now learn what and how great benefits a temperate diet will bring along
with it. In the first place, you will enjoy good health; for you may
believe how detrimental a diversity of things is to any man, when you
recollect that sort of food, which by its simplicity sat so well upon
your stomach some time ago. But, when you have once mixed boiled and
roast together, thrushes and shell-fish; the sweet juices will turn
into bile, and a thick phlegm will bring a jarring upon the stomach. Do
not you see, how pale each guest rises from a perplexing variety of
dishes at an entertainment. Beside this, the body, overloaded with the
debauch of yesterday, depresses the mind along with it, and dashes to
the earth that portion of the divine spirit. Another man, as soon as he
has taken a quick repast, and rendered up his limbs to repose, rises
vigorous to the duties of his calling. However, he may sometimes have
recourse to better cheer; whether the returning year shall bring on a
festival, or if he have a mind to refresh his impaired body; and when
years shall approach, and feeble age require to be used more tenderly.
But as for you, if a troublesome habit of body, or creeping old age,
should come upon you, what addition can be made to that soft indulgence,
which you, now in youth and in health anticipate?
Our ancestors praised a boar when it was stale not because they had no
noses; but with this view, I suppose, that a visitor coming later than
ordinary [might partake of it], though a little musty, rather than the
voracious master should devour it all himself while sweet. I wish that
the primitive earth had produced me among such heroes as these.
Have you any regard for reputation, which affects the human ear more
agreeably than music? Great turbots and dishes bring great disgrace
along with them, together with expense. Add to this, that your relations
and neighbors will be exasperated at you, while you will be at enmity
with yourself and desirous of death in vain, since you will not in your
poverty have three farthings left to purchase a rope withal. Trausius,
you say, may with justice be called to account in such language as this;
but I possess an ample revenue, and wealth sufficient for three
potentates, Why then have you no better method of expending your
superfluities? Why is any man, undeserving [of distressed
circumstances], in want, while you abound: How comes it to pass, that
the ancient temples of the gods are falling to ruin? Why do not you,
wretch that you are, bestow something on your dear country, out of so
vast a hoard? What, will matters always go well with you alone? O thou,
that hereafter shalt be the great derision of thine enemies! which of
the two shall depend upon himself in exigences with most certainty? He
who has used his mind and high-swollen body to redundancies; or he who,
contented with a little and provident for the future, like a Wise man
in time of peace, shall make the necessary preparations for war?
That you may the more readily give credit to these things: I myself,
when a little boy, took notice that this Ofellua did not use his
unencumbered estate more profusely, than he does now it is reduced. You
may see the sturdy husbandman laboring for hire in the land [once his
own, but now] assigned [to others], with his cattle and children,
talking to this effect; I never ventured to eat any thing on a work-day
except pot-herbs, with a hock of smoke-dried bacon. And when a friend
came to visit me after a long absence, or a neighbor, an acceptable
guest to me resting from work on account of the rain, we lived well; not
on fishes fetched from the city, but on a pullet and a kid: then a dried
grape, and a nut, with a large fig, set off our second course. After
this, it was our diversion to have no other regulation in our cups, save
that against drinking to excess; then Ceres worshiped [with a libation],
that the corn might arise in lofty stems, smoothed with wine the
melancholy of the contracted brow. Let fortune rage, and stir up new
tumults what can she do more to impair my estate? How much more savingly
have either I lived, or how much less neatly have you gone, my children,
since this new possessor came? For nature has appointed to be lord of
this earthly property, neither him, nor me, nor any one. He drove us
out: either iniquity or ignorance in the quirks of the law shall [do the
same] him: certainly in the end his long lived heir shall expel him. Now
this field under the denomination of Umbrenus', lately it was Ofellus',
the perpetual property of no man; for it turns to my use one while, and
by and by to that of another. Wherefore, live undaunted; and oppose
gallant breasts against the strokes of adversity.
* * * * *
SATIRE III.
_Damasippus, in a conversation with Horace, proves this paradox of the
Stoic philosophy, that most men are actually mad_.
You write so seldom, as not to call for parchment four times in the
year, busied in reforming your writings, yet are you angry with
yourself, that indulging in wine and sleep you produce nothing worthy to
be the subject of conversation. What will be the consequence? But you
took refuge here, it seems, at the very celebration of the Saturnalia,
out of sobriety.
Dictate therefore something worthy of your promises;
begin. There is nothing. The pens are found fault with to no purpose,
and the harmless wall, which must have been built under the displeasure
of gods and poets, suffers [to no end]. But you had the look of one that
had threatened many and excellent things, when once your villa had
received you, free from employment, under its warm roof. To what purpose
was it to stow Plato upon Menander? Eupolis, Archilochus? For what end
did you bring abroad such companions? What? are you setting about
appeasing envy by deserting virtue? Wretch, you will be despised. That
guilty Siren, Sloth, must be avoided; or whatever acquisitions you have
made in the better part of your life, must with equanimity be given up.
May the gods and godnesses, O Damasippus, present you with a barber for
your sound advice! But by what means did you get so well acquainted with
me? Since all my fortunes were dissipated at the middle of the exchange,
detached from all business of my own, I mind that of other people. For
formerly I used to take a delight in inquiring, in what vase the crafty
Sisyphus might have washed his feet; what was carved in an unworkmanlike
manner, and what more roughly cast than it ought to be; being a
connoisseur, I offered a hundred thousand sesterces for such a statue; I
was the only man who knew how to purchase gardens and fine seats to the
best advantage: whence the crowded ways gave me the surname of
Mercurial. I know it well; and am amazed at your being cured of that
disorder. Why a new disorder expelled the old one in a marvelous manner;
as it is accustomed to do, when the pain of the afflicted side, or the
head, is turned upon the stomach; as it is with a man in a lethargy,
when he turns boxer, and attacks his physician. As long as you do
nothing like this, be it even as you please. O my good friend, do not
deceive yourself; you likewise are mad, and it is almost "fools all," if
what Stertinius insists upon has any truth in it; from whom, being of a
teachable disposition, I derived these admirable precepts, at the very
time when, having given me consolation, he ordered me to cultivate a
philosophical beard, and to return cheerfully from the Fabrician bridge.
For when, my affairs being desperate, I had a mind to throw myself into
the river, having covered my head [for that purpose], he fortunately was
at my elbow; and [addressed me to this effect]: Take care, how do any
thing unworthy of yourself; a false shame, says he, afflicts you, who
dread to be esteemed a madman among madmen. For in the first place, I
will inquire, what it is to be mad: and, if this distemper be in you
exclusively, I will not add a single word, to prevent you from dying
bravely.
The school and sect of Chrysippus deem every man mad, whom vicious folly
or the ignorance of truth drives blindly forward. This definition takes
in whole nations, this even great kings, the wise man [alone] excepted.
Now learn, why all those, who have fixed the name of madman upon you,
are as senseless as yourself. As in the woods, where a mistake makes
people wander about from the proper path; one goes out of the way to the
right, another to the left; there is the same blunder on both sides,
only the illusion is in different directions: in this manner imagine
yourself mad; so that he, who derides you, hangs his tail not one jot
wiser than yourself. There is one species of folly, that dreads things
not in the least formidable; insomuch that it will complain of fires,
and rocks, and rivers opposing it in the open plain; there is another
different from this, but not a whit more approaching to wisdom, that
runs headlong through the midst of flames and floods. Let the loving
mother, the virtuous sister, the father, the wife, together with all the
relations [of a man possessed with this latter folly], cry out: "Here is
a deep ditch; here is a prodigious rock; take care of yourself:" he
would give no more attention, than did the drunken Fufius some time ago,
when he overslept the character of Ilione, twelve hundred Catieni at the
same time roaring out, _O mother, I call you to my aid_. I will
demonstrate to you, that the generality of all mankind are mad in the
commission of some folly similar to this.
Damasippus is mad for purchasing antique statues: but is Damasippus'
creditor in his senses? Well, suppose I should say to you: receive this,
which you can never repay: will you be a madman, if you receive it; or
would you be more absurd for rejecting a booty, which propitious Mercury
offers? Take bond, like the banker Nerius, for ten thousand sesterces;
it will not signify: add the forms of Cicuta, so versed in the knotty
points of law: add a thousand obligations: yet this wicked Proteus will
evade all these ties. When you shall drag him to justice, laughing as if
his cheeks were none of his own; he will be transformed into a boar,
sometimes into a bird, sometimes into a stone, and when he pleases Into
a tree. If to conduct one's affairs badly be the part of a madman; and
the reverse, that of a man well in his senses; brain of Perillius
(believe me), who orders you [that sum of money], which you can never
repay, is much more unsound [than yours].
Whoever grows pale with evil ambition, or the love of money: whoever is
heated with luxury, or gloomy superstition, or any other disease of the
mind, I command him to adjust his garment and attend: hither, all of ye,
come near me in order, while I convince you that you are mad.
By far the largest portion of hellebore is to be administered to the
covetous: I know not, whether reason does not consign all Anticyra to
their use. The heirs of Staberius engraved the sum [which he left them]
upon his tomb: unless they had acted in this manner, they were under an
obligation to exhibit a hundred pair of gladiators to the people, beside
an entertainment according to the direction of Arrius; and as much corn
as is cut in Africa. Whether I have willed this rightly or wrongly, it
was my will; be not severe against me, [cries the testator]. I imagine
the provident mind of Staberius foresaw this. What then did he moan,
when he appointed by will that his heirs should engrave the sum of their
patrimony upon his tomb-stone? As long as he lived, he deemed poverty a
great vice, and nothing did he more industriously avoid: insomuch that,
had he died less rich by one farthing, the more Iniquitous would he have
appeared to himself. For every thing, virtue, fame, glory, divine and
human affairs, are subservient to the attraction of riches; which
whoever shall have accumulated, shall be illustrious, brave, just--What,
wise too? Ay, and a king, and whatever else he pleases. This he was in
hopes would greatly redound to his praise, as if it had been an
acquisition of his virtue. In what respect did the Grecian Aristippus
act like this; who ordered his slaves to throw away his gold in the
midst of Libya; because, encumbered with the burden, they traveled too
slowly? Which is the greater madman of these two? An example is nothing
to the purpose, that decides one controversy by creating another. If any
person were to buy lyres, and [when he had bought them] to stow them in
one place; though neither addicted to the lyre nor to any one muse
whatsoever: if a man were [to buy] paring-knives and lasts, and were no
shoemaker; sails fit for navigation, and were averse to merchandizing;
he every where deservedly be styled delirious, and out of his senses.
How does he differ from these, who boards up cash and gold [and] knows
not how to use them when accumulated, and is afraid to touch them as if
they were consecrated? If any person before a great heap of corn should
keep perpetual watch with a long club, and, though the owner of it, and
hungry, should not dare to take a single grain from it; and should
rather feed upon bitter leaves: if while a thousand hogsheads of Chian,
or old Falernian, is stored up within (nay, that is nothing--three
hundred thousand), he drink nothing, but what is mere sharp vinegars
again--if, wanting but one year of eighty, he should lie upon straw, who
has bed-clothes rotting in his chest, the food of worms and moths; he
would seem mad, belike, but to few persons: because the greatest part of
mankind labors, under the same malady.
Thou dotard, hateful to the gods, dost thou guard [these possessions],
for fear of wanting thyself: to the end that thy son, or even the
freedman thy heir, should guzzle it all up? For how little will each day
deduct from your capital, if you begin to pour better oil upon your
greens and your head, filthy with scurf not combed out? If any thing be
a sufficiency, wherefore are you guilty of perjury [wherefore] do you
rob, and plunder from all quarters? Are you in your senses? If you were
to begin to pelt the populace with stones, and the slaves, which you
purchased with your money; all the: very boys and girls will cry out
that you are a madman. When you dispatch your wife with a rope, and your
mother with poison, are you right in your head? Why not? You neither did
this at Argos, nor slew your mother with the sword, as the mad Orestes
did. What, do you imagine that he ran? mad after he had murdered his
parent; and that he was not driven mad by the wicked Furies, before he
warmed his sharp steel in his mother's throat? Nay, from the time that
Orestes is deemed to have been of a dangerous disposition, he did
nothing in fact that you can blame; he did not dare to offer violence
with his sword to Pylades, nor to his sister Electra; he only gave ill
language to both of them, by calling her a Fury, and him some other
[opprobrious name], which, his violent choler suggested.
Opimius, poor amid silver and gold hoarded up within, who used to drink
out of Campanian ware Veientine wine on holidays, and mere dregs on
common days, was some time ago taken with a prodigious lethargy;
insomuch that his heir was already scouring about his coffers and keys,
in joy and triumph. His physician, a man of much dispatch and fidelity,
raises him in this manner: he orders a table to be brought, and the bags
of money to be poured out, and several persons to approach in order to
count it: by this method he sets the man upon his legs again. And at the
same time he addresses him to this effect. Unless you guard your money
your ravenous heir will even now carry off these [treasures] of yours.
What, while I am alive? That you may live, therefore, awake; do this.
What would you have me do? Why your blood will fail you that are so much
reduced, unless food and some great restorative be administered to your
decaying stomach. Do you hesitate? come on; take this ptisan made of
rice. How much did it cost? A trifle. How much then? Eight asses. Alas!
what does it matter, whether I die of a disease, or by theft and rapine?
Who then is sound? He, who is not a fool. What is the covetous man? Both
a fool and a madman. What--if a man be not covetous, is he immediately
[to be deemed] sound? By no means. Why so, Stoic? I will tell you. Such
a patient (suppose Craterus [the physician] said this) is not sick at
the heart. Is he therefore well, and shall he get up? No, he will forbid
that; because his side or his reins are harassed with an acute disease.
[In like manner], such a man is not perjured, nor sordid; let him then
sacrifice a hog to his propitious household gods. But he is ambitious
and assuming. Let him make a voyage [then] to Anticyra. For what is the
difference, whether you fling whatever you have into a gulf, or make no
use of your acquisitions?
Servius Oppidius, rich in the possession of an ancient estate, is
reported when dying to have divided two farms at Canusium between his
two sons, and to have addressed the boys, called to his bed-side, [in
the following manner]: When I saw you, Aulus, carry your playthings and
nuts carelessly in your bosom, [and] to give them and game them away;
you, Tiberius, count them, and anxious hide them in holes; I was afraid
lest a madness of a different nature should possess you: lest you
[Aulus], should follow the example of Nomentanus, you, [Tiberius], that
of Cicuta. Wherefore each of you, entreated by our household gods, do
you (Aulus) take care lest you lessen; you (Tiberius) lest you make that
greater, which your father thinks and the purposes of nature determine
to be sufficient. Further, lest glory should entice you, I will bind
each of you by an oath: whichever of you shall be an aedile or a
praetor, let him be excommunicated and accursed. Would you destroy your
effects in [largesses of] peas, beans, and lupines, that you may stalk
in the circus at large, or stand in a statue of brass, O madman,
stripped of your paternal estate, stripped of your money? To the end,
forsooth, that you may gain those applauses, which Agrippa gains, like a
cunning fox imitating a generous lion?
O Agamemnon, why do you prohibit any one from burying Ajax? I am a king.
I, a plebeian, make no further inquiry. And I command a just thing: but,
if I seem unjust to any one, I permit you to speak your sentiments with
impunity. Greatest of kings, may the gods grant that, after the taking
of Troy, you may conduct your fleet safe home: may I then have the
liberty to ask questions, and reply in my turn? Ask. Why does Ajax, the
second hero after Achilles, rot [above ground], so often renowned for
having saved the Grecians; that Priam and Priam's people may exult in
his being unburied, by whose means so many youths have been deprived of
their country's rites of sepulture. In his madness he killed a thousand
sheep, crying out that he was destroying the famous Ulysses and
Menelaus, together with me. When you at Aulis substituted your sweet
daughter in the place of a heifer before the altar, and, O impious one,
sprinkled her head with the salt cake; did you preserve soundness of
mind? Why do you ask? What then did the mad Ajax do, when he slew the
flock with his sword? He abstained from any violence to his wife and
child, though he had imprecated many curses on the sons of Atreus: he
neither hurt Teucer, nor even Ulysses himself. But I, out of prudence,
appeased the gods with blood, that I might loose the ships detained on
an adverse shore. Yes, madman! with your own blood. With my own
[indeed], but I was not mad. Whoever shall form images foreign from
reality, and confused in the tumult of impiety, will always be reckoned
disturbed in mind: and it will not matter, whether he go wrong through
folly or through rage. Is Ajax delirious, while he kills the harmless
lambs? Are you right in your head, when you willfully commit a crime for
empty titles? And is your heart pure, while it is swollen with the vice?
If any person should take a delight to carry about with him in his sedan
a pretty lambkin; and should provide clothes, should provide maids and
gold for it, as for a daughter, should call it Rufa and Rufilla, and
should destine it a wife for some stout husband; the praetor would
take power from him being interdicted, and the management of him would
devolve to his relations, that were in their senses. What, if a man
devote his daughter instead of a dumb lambkin, is he right of mind?
Never say it. Therefore, wherever there is a foolish depravity, there
will be the height of madness. He who is wicked, will be frantic too:
Bellona, who delights in bloodshed, has thundered about him, whom
precarious fame has captivated.
Now, come on, arraign with me luxury and Nomentanus; for reason will
evince that foolish spendthrifts are mad. This fellow, as soon as he
received a thousand talents of patrimony, issues an order that the
fishmonger, the fruiterer, the poulterer, the perfumer, and the impious
gang of the Tuscan alley, sausage-maker, and buffoons, the whole
shambles, together with [all] Velabrum, should come to his house in the
morning. What was the consequence? They came in crowds. The pander makes
a speech: "Whatever I, or whatever each of these has at home, believe it
to be yours: and give your order for it either directly, or to-morrow. "
Hear what reply the considerate youth made: "You sleep booted in
Lucanian snow, that I may feast on a boar: you sweep the wintry seas for
fish: I am indolent, and unworthy to possess so much. Away with it: do
you take for your share ten hundred thousand sesterces; you as much; you
thrice the sum, from whose house your spouse runs, when called for, at
midnight. " The son of Aesopus, [the actor] (that he might, forsooth,
swallow a million of sesterces at a draught), dissolved in vinegar a
precious pearl, which he had taken from the ear of Metella: how much
wiser was he [in doing this,] than if he had thrown the same into a
rapid river, or the common sewer? The progeny of Quintius Arrius, an
illustrious pair of brothers, twins in wickedness and trifling and the
love of depravity, used to dine upon nightingales bought at a vast
expense: to whom do these belong? Are they in their senses? Are they to
be marked With chalk, or with charcoal?
If an [aged person] with a long beard should take a delight to build
baby-houses, to yoke mice to a go-cart, to play at odd and even, to ride
upon a long cane, madness must be his motive. If reason shall evince,
that to be in love is a more childish thing than these; and that there
is no difference whether you play the same games in the dust as when
three years old, or whine in anxiety for the love of a harlot: I beg to
know, if you will act as the reformed Polemon did of old? Will you lay
aside those ensigns of your disease, your rollers, your mantle, your
mufflers; as he in his cups is said to have privately torn the chaplet
from his neck, after he was corrected by the speech of his fasting
master? When you offer apples to an angry boy, he refuses them: here,
take them, you little dog; he denies you: if you don't give them, he
wants them. In what does an excluded lover differ [from such a boy];
when he argues with himself whether he should go or not to that very
place whither he was returning without being sent for, and cleaves to
the hated doors? "What shall I not go to her now, when she invites me of
her own accord? or shall I rather think of putting an end to my pains?
She has excluded me; she recalls me: shall I return? No, not if she
would implore me. " Observe the servant, not a little wiser: "O master,
that which has neither moderation nor conduct, can not be guided by
reason or method. In love these evils are inherent; war [one while],
then peace again. If any one should endeavor to ascertain these things,
that are various as the weather, and fluctuating by blind chance; he
will make no more of it, than if he should set about raving by right
reason and rule. " What--when, picking the pippins from the Picenian
apples, you rejoice if haply you have hit the vaulted roof; are you
yourself? What--when you strike out faltering accents from your
antiquated palate, how much wiser are you than [a child] that builds
little houses? To the folly [of love] add bloodshed, and stir the fire
with a sword. I ask you, when Marius lately, after he had stabbed
Hellas, threw himself down a precipice, was he raving mad? Or will you
absolve the man from the imputation of a disturbed mind, and condemn him
for the crime, according to your custom, imposing, on things named that
have an affinity in signification?
There was a certain freedman, who, an old man, ran about the streets in
a morning fasting, with his hands washed, and prayed thus: "Snatch me
alone from death" (adding some solemn vow), "me alone, for it is an easy
matter for the gods:" this man was sound in both his ears and eyes; but
his master, when he sold him, would except his understanding, unless he
were fond of law-suits. This crowd too Chrysippus places in the fruitful
family of Menenius.
O Jupiter, who givest and takest away great afflictions, (cries the
mother of a boy, now lying sick abed for five months), if this cold
quartan ague should leave the child, in the morning of that day on which
you enjoy a fast, he shall stand naked in the Tiber. Should chance or
the physician relieve the patient from his imminent danger, the
infatuated mother will destroy [the boy] placed on the cold bank, and
will bring back the fever. With what disorder of the mind is she
stricken? Why, with a superstitious fear of the gods.
These arms Stertinius, the eighth of the wise men, gave to me, as to a
friend, that for the future I might not be roughly accosted without
avenging myself. Whosoever shall call me madman, shall hear as much from
me [in return]; and shall learn to look back upon the bag that hangs
behind him.
O Stoic, so may you, after your damage, sell all your merchandise the
better: what folly (for, [it seems,] there are more kinds than one) do
you think I am infatuated with? For to myself I seem sound. What--when
mad Agave carries the amputated head of her unhappy son, does she then
seem mad to herself? I allow myself a fool (let me yield to the truth)
and a madman likewise: only declare this, with what distemper of mind
you think me afflicted. Hear, then: in the first place you build; that
is, though from top to bottom you are but of the two-foot size you
imitate the tall: and you, the same person, laugh at the spirit and
strut of Turbo in armor, too great for his [little] body: how are you
less ridiculous than him? What--is it fitting that, in every thing
Maecenas does, you, who are so very much unlike him and so much his
inferior, should vie with him? The young ones of a frog being in her
absence crushed by the foot of a calf, when one of them had made his
escape, he told his mother what a huge beast had dashed his brethren to
pieces. She began to ask, how big? Whether it were so great? puffing
herself up. Greater by half. What, so big? when she had swelled herself
more and more. If you should burst yourself, says he, you will not be
equal to it. This image bears no great dissimilitude to you. Now add
poems (that is, add oil to the fire), which if ever any man in his
senses made, why so do you. I do not mention your horrid rage. At
length, have done--your way of living beyond your fortune--confine
yourself to your own affairs, Damasippus--those thousand passions for
the fair, the young. Thou greater madman, at last, spare thy inferior.
* * * * *
SATIRE IV.
_He ridicules the absurdity of one Catius, who placed the summit of
human felicity in the culinary art_.
Whence, and whither, Catius? I have not time [to converse with you],
being desirous of impressing on my memory some new precepts; such as
excel Pythagoras, and him that was accused by Anytus, and the learned
Plato. I acknowledge my offense, since I have interrupted you at so
unlucky a juncture: but grant me your pardon, good sir, I beseech you.
If any thing should have slipped you now, you will presently recollect
it: whether this talent of yours be of nature, or of art, you are
amazing in both. Nay, but I was anxious, how I might retain all [these
precepts]; as being things of a delicate nature, and in a delicate
style. Tell me the name of this man; and at the same time whether he is
a Roman, or a foreigner? As I have them by heart, I will recite the
precepts: the author shall be concealed.
Remember to serve up those eggs that are of an oblong make, as being of
sweeter flavor and more nutritive than the round ones: for, being
tough-shelled, they contain a male yelk. Cabbage that grows in dry
lands, is sweeter than that about town: nothing is more insipid than a
garden much watered. If a visitor should come unexpectedly upon you in
the evening, lest the tough old hen prove disagreeable to his palate,
you must learn to drown it in Falernian wine mixed [with water]: this
will make it tender. The mushrooms that grow in meadows, are of the best
kind: all others are dangerously trusted. That man shall spend his
summers healthy who shall finish his dinners with mulberries black [with
ripeness], which he shall have gathered from the tree before the sun
becomes violent. Aufidius used to mix honey with strong Falernian
injudiciously; because it is right to commit nothing to the empty veins,
but what is emollient: you will, with more propriety, wash your stomach
with soft mead. If your belly should be hard bound, the limpet and
coarse cockles will remove obstructions, and leaves of the small sorrel;
but not without Coan white wine. The increasing moons swell the
lubricating shell-fish. But every sea is not productive of the exquisite
sorts. The Lucrine muscle is better than the Baian murex: [The best]
oysters come from the Circaean promontory; cray-fish from Misenum: the
soft Tarentum plumes herself on her broad escalops. Let no one
presumptuously arrogate to himself the science of banqueting, unless the
nice doctrine of tastes has been previously considered by him with exact
system. Nor is it enough to sweep away a parcel of fishes from the
expensive stalls, [while he remains] ignorant for what sort stewed sauce
is more proper, and what being roasted, the sated guest will presently
replace himself on his elbow. Let the boar from Umbria, and that which
has been fed with the acorns of the scarlet oak, bend the round dishes
of him who dislikes all flabby meat: for the Laurentian boar, fattened
with flags and reeds, is bad. The vineyard does not always afford the
most eatable kids. A man of sense will be fond of the shoulders of a
pregnant hare. What is the proper age and nature of fish and fowl,
though inquired after, was never discovered before my palate.
