_Meracus_
is properly
applied to unmixed _wine_; _merus_, to any _other_ liquid.
applied to unmixed _wine_; _merus_, to any _other_ liquid.
Satires
" xiii.
, Ep.
xiii.
[1385] _Orestes. _ Cf. Juv. , xiv. , 285.
SATIRE IV.
ARGUMENT.
Had Persius lived _after_ instead of before Juvenal we might have
imagined that he had taken for the theme the noble lines in his
eighth Satire,
"Omne animi vitium tanto conspectius in se
Crimen habet quanto Major qui peccat habetur. " viii. , 140.
"For still more public scandal Vice extends,
As he is great and noble who offends. "--Dryden.
Or had he drawn from the fountains of inspired wisdom, that he
had had in his eye a passage of still more solemn import: "A
sharp judgment shall be to them that be in high places. For mercy
will soon pardon the meanest; but mighty men shall be mightily
tormented. " Wisdom, vi. , 5. Either of these passages might fairly
serve as the argument of this Satire. What, however, Persius
really took as his model is the First Alcibiades of Plato, and
the imitation of it is nearly as close as is that of the Second
Alcibiades in the Second Satire. And the subject of his criticism
is no less a personage than Nero himself. The close analogy between
Nero and Alcibiades will be further alluded to in the notes. We
must remember that Nero was but seventeen years old when he was
called to take the reins of government, and was but three years
younger than Persius himself. The Satire was probably written
before Nero had entirely thrown off the mask; at all events, before
he had given the full evidence which he afterward did of the savage
ferocity and gross licentiousness of his true nature. There was
enough indeed for the stern Satirist to censure; but still a spark
of something noble remaining, to kindle the hope that the reproof
might work improvement. In his First Satire he had ridiculed his
pretensions to the name of Poet; in this he exposes his inability
as a Politician. The Satire naturally and readily divides itself
into three parts. In the first he ridicules the misplaced ambition
of those who covet exalted station, and aspire to take the lead in
state affairs, without possessing those qualifications of talent,
education, and experience, which alone could fit them to take the
helm of government; and who hold that the adventitious privileges
of high birth and ancient lineage can countervail the enervating
effects of luxurious indolence and vicious self-indulgence. The
second division of the subject turns on the much-neglected duty of
self-examination; and enforces the duty of uprightness and purity
of conduct from the consideration, that while it is hopeless in
all to escape the keen scrutiny that all men exercise in their
neighbor's failings, while they are at the same time utterly
blind to their own defects, yet that men of high rank and station
must necessarily provoke the more searching criticism, in exact
proportion to the elevation of their position. He points out also
the policy of checking all tendency to satirize the weakness of
others, to which Nero was greatly prone, and in fact had already
aspired to the dignity of a writer of Satire; as such sarcasm only
draws down severer recrimination on ourselves. In the third part
he reverts to the original subject; and urges upon the profligate
nobles of the day the duty of rigid self-scrutiny, by reminding
them of the true character of that worthless rabble, on whose
sordid judgment and mercenary applause they ground their claims to
approbation. This love of the "aura popularis" was Nero's besetting
vice; and none could doubt for whom the advice was meant. Yet
the allusions to Nero throughout the Satire, transparent as they
must have been to his contemporaries, are so dexterously covered
that Persius might easily have secured himself from all charge
of personally attacking the emperor under the plea that his sole
object was a declamatory exercise in imitation of the Dialogue cf
Plato.
"Dost thou wield the affairs of the state? "[1386]--(Imagine the
bearded[1387] master, whom the fell draught of hemlock[1388] took off,
to be saying this:)--Relying on what? Speak, thou ward[1389] of great
Pericles. Has talent, forsooth, and precocious knowledge of the world,
come before thy beard? Knowest thou what must be spoken, and what
kept back? And, therefore, when the populace is boiling with excited
passion, does your spirit move you to impose silence on the crowd by
the majesty of your hand? [1390] and what will you say then? "I think,
Quirites, this is not just! That is bad! This is the properer course? "
For you know how to weigh the justice of the case in the double scale
of the doubtful balance. You can discern the straight line when it lies
between curves,[1391] or when the rule misleads by its distorted foot;
and you are competent to affix the Theta[1392] of condemnation to a
defect.
Why do you not then (adorned in vain with outer skin[1393]) cease to
display your tail[1394] before the day to the fawning rabble, more fit
to swallow down undiluted Anticyras? [1395]
What is your chief good? to have lived always on rich dishes; and a
skin made delicate by constant basking in the sun? [1396] Stay: this
old woman would scarce give a different answer--"Go now! I am son of
Dinomache! "[1397] Puff yourself up! --"I am beautiful. " Granted! Still
Baucis, though in tatters, has no worse philosophy, when she has cried
her herbs[1398] to good purpose to some slovenly slave.
How is it that not a man tries to descend into himself? Not a man! But
our gaze is fixed on the wallet[1399] on the back in front of us! You
may ask, "Do you know Vectidius' farms! " Whose? The rich fellow that
cultivates more land at Cures than a kite[1400] can fly over! Him do
you mean? Him, born under the wrath of Heaven, and an inauspicious
Genius, who whenever he fixes his yoke at the beaten cross ways,[1401]
fearing to scrape off the clay incrusted on the diminutive vessel,
groans out, "May this be well! " and munching an onion in its hull, with
some salt, and a dish of frumety (his slaves applauding the while),
sups up the mothery dregs of vapid vinegar.
But if, well essenced, you lounge away your time and bask in the sun,
there stands by you one, unkenned, to touch you with his elbow, and
spit out his bitter detestation on your morals--on _you_, who by vile
arts make your body delicate! While you comb the perfumed hair[1402] on
your cheeks, why are you closely shorn elsewhere? when, though five
wrestlers pluck out the weeds, the rank fern will yield to no amount of
toil.
"We strike;[1403] and in our turn expose our limbs to the arrows. It is
thus we live. Thus we know it to be. You have a secret wound, though
the baldric hides it with its broad gold. As you please! Impose upon
your own powers; deceive _them_ if you can! "
"While the whole neighborhood pronounces me to be super-excellent,
shall I not credit[1404] them? "
If you grow pale, vile wretch, at the sight of money; if you execute
all that suggests itself to your lust; if you cautiously lash the forum
with many a stroke,[1405] in vain you present to the rabble your
thirsty[1406] ears. Cast off from you that which you are not. Let the
cobbler[1407] bear off his presents. Dwell with yourself,[1408] and you
will know how short your household stuff is.
FOOTNOTES:
[1386] _Rem populi tractas? _ from the Greek περὶ τῶν τοῦ δήμου
πραγμάτων βουλεύεσθαι. The imitations of the First Alcibiades are very
close throughout the Satire. Even in our own day, in looking back upon
ancient history, it would be difficult to find two persons so nearly
counterparts of each other as Nero and Alcibiades; not only in their
personal character but in the adventitious circumstances of their life.
Both came into public life at a very early age. Nero was emperor before
he was seventeen years old, and Alcibiades was barely twenty at the
siege of Potidæa. Seneca was to Nero what Socrates was to Alcibiades.
Both derived their claims to pre-eminence from the _mother's_ side:
Nero through Agrippina, from the Julian gens; Alcibiades through
Dinomache, from the Alemæonidæ. The public influence of both extended
through nearly the same period, thirteen years. Both were notorious
for the same vices: love of self-indulgence, ambition of pre-eminence,
personal vanity, lawless insolence toward others, lavish expenditure,
and utter disregard of all principle. It would be very easy to carry
out the parallel into greater detail. Comp. Suet. , Nero, c. 26, with
Grote's Greece, vol. vii. , ch. 55.
[1387] _Barbatum. _ Cf. Juv. , xiv. , 12, "Barbatos licet admoveas mille
inde magistros. " Cic. , Fin. , iv. , "Barba sylvosa et pulcrè alita
inter hominis eruditi insignia recensetur. " Hor. , ii. , Sat. iii. , 34,
"Tempore quo me solatus jussit sapientem pascere barbam. "
[1388] _Cicutæ. _ Cf. ad Juv. , vii, 206.
[1389] _Pupille. _ Alcibiades was left an orphan at the age of five
years, his father, Clinias, having been killed at the battle of
Coronea; when he was placed with his younger brother Clinias, under
the guardianship of Pericles and his brother Ariphron, to whom his
ungovernable passions, even in his boyhood, were a source of great
grief. Of this connection Alcibiades was very proud. Cf. Plat. , Alc. ,
c. 1. Nero lost his father when scarcely three years old; and at the
age of eleven, he was adopted by Claudius and placed under the care
of Annæus Seneca. It is curious that the first public act of both was
an act of liberality to the people. Compare the account of Nero's
proposing the Congiarium (Suet. , Nero, c. 7), with the anecdote of
the quail of Alcibiades told by Plutarch (in Vit. , c. 10). There is
probably also a bitter sarcasm in the word "pupille," as it was the
term of contempt applied to Nero by Poppæa, who was impatient to be
married to him, which the control of his mother Agrippina, and the
influence of Seneca and Burrhus, delayed. Cf. Tac. , Ann. , xiv. , I,
"Quæ (Poppæa) aliquando per facetias incusaret Principem et _pupillum_
vocaret qui jussis alienis obnoxius non modo imperii sed libertatis
etiam indigeret. " Some imagine _pericli_ to be intended as a pun, "One
that would prove _dangerous_ hereafter;" as Alcibiades was compared to
a lion's whelp, Arist. , Ran. , 1431, οὐ χρὴ λέοντος σκύμνον ἐν πόλει
τρέφειν ἤν δ' ἐκτρέφῃ τις, τοῖς τρόποις ὑπηρετεῖν.
[1390] _Majestate manûs. _ Ov. , Met. , i. , 205, "Quam fuit illa Jovi: qui
postquam voce, _manuque_ Murmura compressit, tenuere silentia cuncti. "
So Lucan says of Cæsar, "Utque satis trepidum turbâ coeunte tumultum
Composuit vultu, _dextrâque_ silentia jussit. " Cf. Acts, xiii. 16.
[1391] _Curva. _ The Stoic notion that virtue is a straight line; vices,
curved: the virtues occasionally approaching nearer to one curve than
the other. Cf. Arist. , Eth. , II. , vii. and viii. ; and Sat. , iii. , 52,
"Haud tibi inexpertum _curvos_ deprendere mores, Quæque docet sapiens
braccatis illita Medis Porticus. "
[1392] _Nigrum Theta. _ The Θ, the first letter of θάνατος, was set
by the Judices against the names of those whom they adjuged worthy
of death, and was hence used by critics to obelize passages they
condemned or disapproved of; the contrary being marked with Χ, for
χρηστόν. Cf. Mart. , vii. , Ep. xxxvii. , 1, "Nosti mortiferum quæstoris,
Castrice, signum, Est operæ pretium discere theta novum. " Auson. , Ep.
128, "Tuumque nomen theta sectilis signet. " Sidon. , Carm. , ix. , 335,
"Isti qui valet exarationi Districtum bonus applicare theta. " (It was
also used on tomb-stones, and as a mark to tick off the dead on the
muster-roll of soldiers. )
[1393] _Summâ pella decorus. _ The personal beauty of Alcibiades is
proverbial. Suetonius does not give a very unfavorable account of
Nero's exterior, "Staturâ fuit prope justâ, sufflavo capillo, vultu
pulchro magis quam venusto, oculis cæsiis. " The rest of the picture
is not quite so flattering. It should be observed, by the way,
that Suetonius speaks in terms by no means disparaging of Nero's
verses, which, he says, flowed easily and naturally: he discards the
insinuation that they were mere translations, or plagiarisms, as he
says he had ocular proof to the contrary. Suet. , Vit. , c. 51, 2.
[1394] _Caudam jactare_, a metaphor either from "a dog fawning," or "a
peacock displaying its tail. " Hor. , ii. , Sat. ii. , 26, "Rara avis et
pictâ pandat spectacula caudâ. "
[1395] _Anticyras. _ Cf. ad Juv. , xiii. , 97. Hor. , ii. , Ep. ii. , 137,
"Expulit helleboro morbum bilemque meraco. " Lucian, ἐν Πλοίῳ, 45, καὶ
ὁ ἑλλέβορος ἱκανὸς ποιῆσαι ζωρότερος ποθείς.
_Meracus_ is properly
applied to unmixed _wine_; _merus_, to any _other_ liquid.
[1396] _Curata cuticula sole. _ Cf. ad Juv. , xi. , 203, "Nostra bibat
vernum contracta cuticula solem. " Alluding to the _apricatio_, or
"sunning themselves," of which old men are so fond. Line 33. Sat. v. ,
179. Cic. , de Senect. , xvi. Mart. , x. , Ep. xii. , 7, "I precor et totos
avida cute combibe soles, Quam formosus eris, dum peregrinus eris. "
Plin. , Ep. iii. , 1. "Ubi hora balinei nuntiata est, in sole, si caret
vento, ambulat nudus. " iv. , Ep. 5, "Post cibum sæpe æstate si quod
otii, jacebat in sole. " Cic. , Att. , vii. , 11. Mart. , i. , Ep. lxxviii. ,
4. Juv. , ii. , 105, "Et curare cutem summi constantia civis. " Hor. ,
i. , Ep. iv. , 29, "In cute curandâ plus æquo operata juventus. " iv. ,
15, "Me pinguem et nitidum bene curatâ cute vises. " Cf. Sat. ii. , 37,
"Pelliculam curare jube. "
[1397] _Dinomaches. _ Vid. line 1. Plut. , Alc. , 1. It appears from
Plat. , Alc. , cxviii. , that it was a name Alcibiades delighted in.
[1398] _Ocima. _ Properly the herb "Basil," _ocimum Basilicum_, either
from ὠκὺς, from its "rapid growth," or from ὄζειν, from its "fragrance. "
[1399] _Mantica. _ From Phædrus, lib. iv. , Fab. x. , "Peras imposuit
Jupiter nobis duas: propriis repletam vitiis post tergum dedit: Alienis
ante pectus suspendit gravem. Hâc re videre nostra mala non possumus:
alii simul delinquunt, censores sumus. " So Petr. , Frag. Traj. , 57, "In
alio peduclum vides: in te ricinum non vides. " Cat. , xxii. , 20, "Suus
quoique attributus est error: Sed non videmus manticæ quod in tergo
est. "
[1400] _Quantum non milvus. _ Cf. Juv. , ix. , 55, "Tot milvos intra tua
pascua lassos. "
[1401] _Pertusa ad compita. _ "Compita" are places where three or more
roads meet, from the old verb bito or beto. At these places altars,
or little chapels, were erected with as many sides as there were ways
meeting. (Jani bifrontes. ) Cf. v. , 35, "Ramosa in compita. " Hence they
are called "pertusa," i. e. , _pervia_, "open in all directions. " At
these chapels it was the custom for the rustics to suspend the worn-out
implements of husbandry. Though some think this was more especially
done at the Compitalia. This festival was one of those which the Romans
called Feriæ Conceptivæ, being fixed annually by the Prætor. They
generally followed close upon the Saturnalia, and were held sometimes
three days before the kalends of January, sometimes on the kalends
themselves. Vid. Cic. , Pis. , iv. Auson. , Ecl. de Fev. , "Et nunquam
certis redeuntia festa diebus, Compita per vicos quum sua quisque
colit. " According to Servius, they are described, though not by name,
by Virgil, Æn. , viii. , 717. Like the Quinquatrus, they lasted only
one day, and on that occasion additional wooden chapels were erected,
the sacrificial cakes were provided by different houses, and slaves,
not freedmen, presided at the sacrifices. Vid. Plin. , XXXVI. , xxvii. ,
70. The gods whom they worshiped are said to have been the Lares
Compitales, of whom various legends are current. But this is doubtful.
Augustus appointed certain rites in their honor, twice in the year.
Suet. , Vit. , c. xxxi. , "Compitales Lares ornari bis anno instituit
vernis floribus et æstivis. " It seems to have been a season of rustic
revelry and feasting, and of license for slaves, like the Saturnalia.
The avarice of the miser, therefore, on such an occasion, is the more
conspicuous. His vessel is but a small one (seriola), and its contents
woolly (pannosam) with age (veterem); yet he grudges scraping off the
clay (limum) with which they used to stop their vessels, in order to
pour a libation of his sour wine.
[1402] _Balanatum gausape. _ The Balanus, or "Arabian Balsam," was
considered one of the most expensive perfumes. πρὸς τὰ πολυτελῆ μύρα
ἀντ' ἐλαίου ἔχρωντο. Dioscor. , iv. , 160. Cf. Hor. , iii. , Od. xxix. , 4,
"Pressa tuis _balanus_ capillis Jamdudum apud me est. " The gausape is
properly a thick shaggy kind of stuff. Hence Sen. , Ep. 53, "Frigidæ
cultor mitto me in mare quomodo psychrolutam decet, gausapatus. "
Lucil. , xx. , Fr. 9, "Purpureo tersit tunc latas gausape mensas. " From
whom Horace copies, ii. , Sat. viii. , 10, "Puer alte cinctus acernam
gausape purpureo mensam pertersit. " It is here used for "a very thick,
bushy beard. "
[1403] _Cædimus. _ A metaphor from gladiators, which is continued
through the next three lines. "While we are intent on wounding our
adversaries, we leave our own weak points unguarded;" i. e. , while
satirizing others, we are quite forgetful of and blind to our own
defects. There is here also a covert allusion to Nero, who, though so
open to sarcasm, yet took upon him to satirize others. Cf. ad Juv. ,
iv. , 106, "Et tamen improbior satiram scribente cinædo. "
[1404] _Non credam. _ Sen. , Ep. lix. , 11, "Cito nobis placemus: si
invenimus qui nos bonos viros dicat, qui prudentes, qui sanctos,
agnoscimus. Nec sumus modicâ laudatione contenti: quidquid in nos
adulatio sine pudore congessit, tanquam debitum prendimus: optimos nos
esse sapientissimos affirmantibus assentimur. "
[1405] _Puteal flagellas. _ "This line," Casaubon says, "was purposely
intended to be obscure; that while all would apply it in one sense
to Nero, Persius, if accused, might maintain that he intended only
the other sense, which the words at first sight bear. " Puteal is
put for the forum itself by synecdoche. It is properly the "puteal
Libonis," a place which L. Scribonius Libo caused to be inclosed
(perhaps cir. A. U. C. 604). It had been perhaps a bidental (cf. ad Sat.
ii. , 27), or, as others say, the place where the razor of the augur
Nævius was deposited. Near it was the prætor's chair, and the benches
frequented by persons who had private suits, among whom the class of
usurers would be most conspicuous. (Hence Hor. , i. , Epist. xix. , 8,
"Forum putealque Libonis Mandabo siccis. " ii. , Sat. vi. , 35. ) _Puteal
flagellare_, therefore, is taken in its primitive sense to mean, "to
frequent the forum for the purpose of enforcing rigorous payment from
those to whom you _have_ lent money; or the benches of the usurers, in
quest of persons to whom you _may_ lend it on exorbitant interest. "
Cf. Ov. , Remed. , Am. , 561, "Qui _puteal_ Janumque timet, celeresque
Kalendas. " Cic. , Sext. , 8. In its secondary sense, it may apply to the
nightly atrocities of Nero, who used to frequent the forum, violently
assaulting those he met, and outrageously insulting females, not
unfrequently committing robberies and even murder; but having been
soundly beaten one night by a nobleman whose wife he had outraged, he
went ever after attended by gladiators, as a security for his personal
safety; who kept aloof until their services were required. Nero might
well, therefore, be called the "scourge of the Forum," and be said
to leave scars and wales behind him in the scenes of his enormities.
Juvenal (Sat. iii. , 278, _seq.
[1385] _Orestes. _ Cf. Juv. , xiv. , 285.
SATIRE IV.
ARGUMENT.
Had Persius lived _after_ instead of before Juvenal we might have
imagined that he had taken for the theme the noble lines in his
eighth Satire,
"Omne animi vitium tanto conspectius in se
Crimen habet quanto Major qui peccat habetur. " viii. , 140.
"For still more public scandal Vice extends,
As he is great and noble who offends. "--Dryden.
Or had he drawn from the fountains of inspired wisdom, that he
had had in his eye a passage of still more solemn import: "A
sharp judgment shall be to them that be in high places. For mercy
will soon pardon the meanest; but mighty men shall be mightily
tormented. " Wisdom, vi. , 5. Either of these passages might fairly
serve as the argument of this Satire. What, however, Persius
really took as his model is the First Alcibiades of Plato, and
the imitation of it is nearly as close as is that of the Second
Alcibiades in the Second Satire. And the subject of his criticism
is no less a personage than Nero himself. The close analogy between
Nero and Alcibiades will be further alluded to in the notes. We
must remember that Nero was but seventeen years old when he was
called to take the reins of government, and was but three years
younger than Persius himself. The Satire was probably written
before Nero had entirely thrown off the mask; at all events, before
he had given the full evidence which he afterward did of the savage
ferocity and gross licentiousness of his true nature. There was
enough indeed for the stern Satirist to censure; but still a spark
of something noble remaining, to kindle the hope that the reproof
might work improvement. In his First Satire he had ridiculed his
pretensions to the name of Poet; in this he exposes his inability
as a Politician. The Satire naturally and readily divides itself
into three parts. In the first he ridicules the misplaced ambition
of those who covet exalted station, and aspire to take the lead in
state affairs, without possessing those qualifications of talent,
education, and experience, which alone could fit them to take the
helm of government; and who hold that the adventitious privileges
of high birth and ancient lineage can countervail the enervating
effects of luxurious indolence and vicious self-indulgence. The
second division of the subject turns on the much-neglected duty of
self-examination; and enforces the duty of uprightness and purity
of conduct from the consideration, that while it is hopeless in
all to escape the keen scrutiny that all men exercise in their
neighbor's failings, while they are at the same time utterly
blind to their own defects, yet that men of high rank and station
must necessarily provoke the more searching criticism, in exact
proportion to the elevation of their position. He points out also
the policy of checking all tendency to satirize the weakness of
others, to which Nero was greatly prone, and in fact had already
aspired to the dignity of a writer of Satire; as such sarcasm only
draws down severer recrimination on ourselves. In the third part
he reverts to the original subject; and urges upon the profligate
nobles of the day the duty of rigid self-scrutiny, by reminding
them of the true character of that worthless rabble, on whose
sordid judgment and mercenary applause they ground their claims to
approbation. This love of the "aura popularis" was Nero's besetting
vice; and none could doubt for whom the advice was meant. Yet
the allusions to Nero throughout the Satire, transparent as they
must have been to his contemporaries, are so dexterously covered
that Persius might easily have secured himself from all charge
of personally attacking the emperor under the plea that his sole
object was a declamatory exercise in imitation of the Dialogue cf
Plato.
"Dost thou wield the affairs of the state? "[1386]--(Imagine the
bearded[1387] master, whom the fell draught of hemlock[1388] took off,
to be saying this:)--Relying on what? Speak, thou ward[1389] of great
Pericles. Has talent, forsooth, and precocious knowledge of the world,
come before thy beard? Knowest thou what must be spoken, and what
kept back? And, therefore, when the populace is boiling with excited
passion, does your spirit move you to impose silence on the crowd by
the majesty of your hand? [1390] and what will you say then? "I think,
Quirites, this is not just! That is bad! This is the properer course? "
For you know how to weigh the justice of the case in the double scale
of the doubtful balance. You can discern the straight line when it lies
between curves,[1391] or when the rule misleads by its distorted foot;
and you are competent to affix the Theta[1392] of condemnation to a
defect.
Why do you not then (adorned in vain with outer skin[1393]) cease to
display your tail[1394] before the day to the fawning rabble, more fit
to swallow down undiluted Anticyras? [1395]
What is your chief good? to have lived always on rich dishes; and a
skin made delicate by constant basking in the sun? [1396] Stay: this
old woman would scarce give a different answer--"Go now! I am son of
Dinomache! "[1397] Puff yourself up! --"I am beautiful. " Granted! Still
Baucis, though in tatters, has no worse philosophy, when she has cried
her herbs[1398] to good purpose to some slovenly slave.
How is it that not a man tries to descend into himself? Not a man! But
our gaze is fixed on the wallet[1399] on the back in front of us! You
may ask, "Do you know Vectidius' farms! " Whose? The rich fellow that
cultivates more land at Cures than a kite[1400] can fly over! Him do
you mean? Him, born under the wrath of Heaven, and an inauspicious
Genius, who whenever he fixes his yoke at the beaten cross ways,[1401]
fearing to scrape off the clay incrusted on the diminutive vessel,
groans out, "May this be well! " and munching an onion in its hull, with
some salt, and a dish of frumety (his slaves applauding the while),
sups up the mothery dregs of vapid vinegar.
But if, well essenced, you lounge away your time and bask in the sun,
there stands by you one, unkenned, to touch you with his elbow, and
spit out his bitter detestation on your morals--on _you_, who by vile
arts make your body delicate! While you comb the perfumed hair[1402] on
your cheeks, why are you closely shorn elsewhere? when, though five
wrestlers pluck out the weeds, the rank fern will yield to no amount of
toil.
"We strike;[1403] and in our turn expose our limbs to the arrows. It is
thus we live. Thus we know it to be. You have a secret wound, though
the baldric hides it with its broad gold. As you please! Impose upon
your own powers; deceive _them_ if you can! "
"While the whole neighborhood pronounces me to be super-excellent,
shall I not credit[1404] them? "
If you grow pale, vile wretch, at the sight of money; if you execute
all that suggests itself to your lust; if you cautiously lash the forum
with many a stroke,[1405] in vain you present to the rabble your
thirsty[1406] ears. Cast off from you that which you are not. Let the
cobbler[1407] bear off his presents. Dwell with yourself,[1408] and you
will know how short your household stuff is.
FOOTNOTES:
[1386] _Rem populi tractas? _ from the Greek περὶ τῶν τοῦ δήμου
πραγμάτων βουλεύεσθαι. The imitations of the First Alcibiades are very
close throughout the Satire. Even in our own day, in looking back upon
ancient history, it would be difficult to find two persons so nearly
counterparts of each other as Nero and Alcibiades; not only in their
personal character but in the adventitious circumstances of their life.
Both came into public life at a very early age. Nero was emperor before
he was seventeen years old, and Alcibiades was barely twenty at the
siege of Potidæa. Seneca was to Nero what Socrates was to Alcibiades.
Both derived their claims to pre-eminence from the _mother's_ side:
Nero through Agrippina, from the Julian gens; Alcibiades through
Dinomache, from the Alemæonidæ. The public influence of both extended
through nearly the same period, thirteen years. Both were notorious
for the same vices: love of self-indulgence, ambition of pre-eminence,
personal vanity, lawless insolence toward others, lavish expenditure,
and utter disregard of all principle. It would be very easy to carry
out the parallel into greater detail. Comp. Suet. , Nero, c. 26, with
Grote's Greece, vol. vii. , ch. 55.
[1387] _Barbatum. _ Cf. Juv. , xiv. , 12, "Barbatos licet admoveas mille
inde magistros. " Cic. , Fin. , iv. , "Barba sylvosa et pulcrè alita
inter hominis eruditi insignia recensetur. " Hor. , ii. , Sat. iii. , 34,
"Tempore quo me solatus jussit sapientem pascere barbam. "
[1388] _Cicutæ. _ Cf. ad Juv. , vii, 206.
[1389] _Pupille. _ Alcibiades was left an orphan at the age of five
years, his father, Clinias, having been killed at the battle of
Coronea; when he was placed with his younger brother Clinias, under
the guardianship of Pericles and his brother Ariphron, to whom his
ungovernable passions, even in his boyhood, were a source of great
grief. Of this connection Alcibiades was very proud. Cf. Plat. , Alc. ,
c. 1. Nero lost his father when scarcely three years old; and at the
age of eleven, he was adopted by Claudius and placed under the care
of Annæus Seneca. It is curious that the first public act of both was
an act of liberality to the people. Compare the account of Nero's
proposing the Congiarium (Suet. , Nero, c. 7), with the anecdote of
the quail of Alcibiades told by Plutarch (in Vit. , c. 10). There is
probably also a bitter sarcasm in the word "pupille," as it was the
term of contempt applied to Nero by Poppæa, who was impatient to be
married to him, which the control of his mother Agrippina, and the
influence of Seneca and Burrhus, delayed. Cf. Tac. , Ann. , xiv. , I,
"Quæ (Poppæa) aliquando per facetias incusaret Principem et _pupillum_
vocaret qui jussis alienis obnoxius non modo imperii sed libertatis
etiam indigeret. " Some imagine _pericli_ to be intended as a pun, "One
that would prove _dangerous_ hereafter;" as Alcibiades was compared to
a lion's whelp, Arist. , Ran. , 1431, οὐ χρὴ λέοντος σκύμνον ἐν πόλει
τρέφειν ἤν δ' ἐκτρέφῃ τις, τοῖς τρόποις ὑπηρετεῖν.
[1390] _Majestate manûs. _ Ov. , Met. , i. , 205, "Quam fuit illa Jovi: qui
postquam voce, _manuque_ Murmura compressit, tenuere silentia cuncti. "
So Lucan says of Cæsar, "Utque satis trepidum turbâ coeunte tumultum
Composuit vultu, _dextrâque_ silentia jussit. " Cf. Acts, xiii. 16.
[1391] _Curva. _ The Stoic notion that virtue is a straight line; vices,
curved: the virtues occasionally approaching nearer to one curve than
the other. Cf. Arist. , Eth. , II. , vii. and viii. ; and Sat. , iii. , 52,
"Haud tibi inexpertum _curvos_ deprendere mores, Quæque docet sapiens
braccatis illita Medis Porticus. "
[1392] _Nigrum Theta. _ The Θ, the first letter of θάνατος, was set
by the Judices against the names of those whom they adjuged worthy
of death, and was hence used by critics to obelize passages they
condemned or disapproved of; the contrary being marked with Χ, for
χρηστόν. Cf. Mart. , vii. , Ep. xxxvii. , 1, "Nosti mortiferum quæstoris,
Castrice, signum, Est operæ pretium discere theta novum. " Auson. , Ep.
128, "Tuumque nomen theta sectilis signet. " Sidon. , Carm. , ix. , 335,
"Isti qui valet exarationi Districtum bonus applicare theta. " (It was
also used on tomb-stones, and as a mark to tick off the dead on the
muster-roll of soldiers. )
[1393] _Summâ pella decorus. _ The personal beauty of Alcibiades is
proverbial. Suetonius does not give a very unfavorable account of
Nero's exterior, "Staturâ fuit prope justâ, sufflavo capillo, vultu
pulchro magis quam venusto, oculis cæsiis. " The rest of the picture
is not quite so flattering. It should be observed, by the way,
that Suetonius speaks in terms by no means disparaging of Nero's
verses, which, he says, flowed easily and naturally: he discards the
insinuation that they were mere translations, or plagiarisms, as he
says he had ocular proof to the contrary. Suet. , Vit. , c. 51, 2.
[1394] _Caudam jactare_, a metaphor either from "a dog fawning," or "a
peacock displaying its tail. " Hor. , ii. , Sat. ii. , 26, "Rara avis et
pictâ pandat spectacula caudâ. "
[1395] _Anticyras. _ Cf. ad Juv. , xiii. , 97. Hor. , ii. , Ep. ii. , 137,
"Expulit helleboro morbum bilemque meraco. " Lucian, ἐν Πλοίῳ, 45, καὶ
ὁ ἑλλέβορος ἱκανὸς ποιῆσαι ζωρότερος ποθείς.
_Meracus_ is properly
applied to unmixed _wine_; _merus_, to any _other_ liquid.
[1396] _Curata cuticula sole. _ Cf. ad Juv. , xi. , 203, "Nostra bibat
vernum contracta cuticula solem. " Alluding to the _apricatio_, or
"sunning themselves," of which old men are so fond. Line 33. Sat. v. ,
179. Cic. , de Senect. , xvi. Mart. , x. , Ep. xii. , 7, "I precor et totos
avida cute combibe soles, Quam formosus eris, dum peregrinus eris. "
Plin. , Ep. iii. , 1. "Ubi hora balinei nuntiata est, in sole, si caret
vento, ambulat nudus. " iv. , Ep. 5, "Post cibum sæpe æstate si quod
otii, jacebat in sole. " Cic. , Att. , vii. , 11. Mart. , i. , Ep. lxxviii. ,
4. Juv. , ii. , 105, "Et curare cutem summi constantia civis. " Hor. ,
i. , Ep. iv. , 29, "In cute curandâ plus æquo operata juventus. " iv. ,
15, "Me pinguem et nitidum bene curatâ cute vises. " Cf. Sat. ii. , 37,
"Pelliculam curare jube. "
[1397] _Dinomaches. _ Vid. line 1. Plut. , Alc. , 1. It appears from
Plat. , Alc. , cxviii. , that it was a name Alcibiades delighted in.
[1398] _Ocima. _ Properly the herb "Basil," _ocimum Basilicum_, either
from ὠκὺς, from its "rapid growth," or from ὄζειν, from its "fragrance. "
[1399] _Mantica. _ From Phædrus, lib. iv. , Fab. x. , "Peras imposuit
Jupiter nobis duas: propriis repletam vitiis post tergum dedit: Alienis
ante pectus suspendit gravem. Hâc re videre nostra mala non possumus:
alii simul delinquunt, censores sumus. " So Petr. , Frag. Traj. , 57, "In
alio peduclum vides: in te ricinum non vides. " Cat. , xxii. , 20, "Suus
quoique attributus est error: Sed non videmus manticæ quod in tergo
est. "
[1400] _Quantum non milvus. _ Cf. Juv. , ix. , 55, "Tot milvos intra tua
pascua lassos. "
[1401] _Pertusa ad compita. _ "Compita" are places where three or more
roads meet, from the old verb bito or beto. At these places altars,
or little chapels, were erected with as many sides as there were ways
meeting. (Jani bifrontes. ) Cf. v. , 35, "Ramosa in compita. " Hence they
are called "pertusa," i. e. , _pervia_, "open in all directions. " At
these chapels it was the custom for the rustics to suspend the worn-out
implements of husbandry. Though some think this was more especially
done at the Compitalia. This festival was one of those which the Romans
called Feriæ Conceptivæ, being fixed annually by the Prætor. They
generally followed close upon the Saturnalia, and were held sometimes
three days before the kalends of January, sometimes on the kalends
themselves. Vid. Cic. , Pis. , iv. Auson. , Ecl. de Fev. , "Et nunquam
certis redeuntia festa diebus, Compita per vicos quum sua quisque
colit. " According to Servius, they are described, though not by name,
by Virgil, Æn. , viii. , 717. Like the Quinquatrus, they lasted only
one day, and on that occasion additional wooden chapels were erected,
the sacrificial cakes were provided by different houses, and slaves,
not freedmen, presided at the sacrifices. Vid. Plin. , XXXVI. , xxvii. ,
70. The gods whom they worshiped are said to have been the Lares
Compitales, of whom various legends are current. But this is doubtful.
Augustus appointed certain rites in their honor, twice in the year.
Suet. , Vit. , c. xxxi. , "Compitales Lares ornari bis anno instituit
vernis floribus et æstivis. " It seems to have been a season of rustic
revelry and feasting, and of license for slaves, like the Saturnalia.
The avarice of the miser, therefore, on such an occasion, is the more
conspicuous. His vessel is but a small one (seriola), and its contents
woolly (pannosam) with age (veterem); yet he grudges scraping off the
clay (limum) with which they used to stop their vessels, in order to
pour a libation of his sour wine.
[1402] _Balanatum gausape. _ The Balanus, or "Arabian Balsam," was
considered one of the most expensive perfumes. πρὸς τὰ πολυτελῆ μύρα
ἀντ' ἐλαίου ἔχρωντο. Dioscor. , iv. , 160. Cf. Hor. , iii. , Od. xxix. , 4,
"Pressa tuis _balanus_ capillis Jamdudum apud me est. " The gausape is
properly a thick shaggy kind of stuff. Hence Sen. , Ep. 53, "Frigidæ
cultor mitto me in mare quomodo psychrolutam decet, gausapatus. "
Lucil. , xx. , Fr. 9, "Purpureo tersit tunc latas gausape mensas. " From
whom Horace copies, ii. , Sat. viii. , 10, "Puer alte cinctus acernam
gausape purpureo mensam pertersit. " It is here used for "a very thick,
bushy beard. "
[1403] _Cædimus. _ A metaphor from gladiators, which is continued
through the next three lines. "While we are intent on wounding our
adversaries, we leave our own weak points unguarded;" i. e. , while
satirizing others, we are quite forgetful of and blind to our own
defects. There is here also a covert allusion to Nero, who, though so
open to sarcasm, yet took upon him to satirize others. Cf. ad Juv. ,
iv. , 106, "Et tamen improbior satiram scribente cinædo. "
[1404] _Non credam. _ Sen. , Ep. lix. , 11, "Cito nobis placemus: si
invenimus qui nos bonos viros dicat, qui prudentes, qui sanctos,
agnoscimus. Nec sumus modicâ laudatione contenti: quidquid in nos
adulatio sine pudore congessit, tanquam debitum prendimus: optimos nos
esse sapientissimos affirmantibus assentimur. "
[1405] _Puteal flagellas. _ "This line," Casaubon says, "was purposely
intended to be obscure; that while all would apply it in one sense
to Nero, Persius, if accused, might maintain that he intended only
the other sense, which the words at first sight bear. " Puteal is
put for the forum itself by synecdoche. It is properly the "puteal
Libonis," a place which L. Scribonius Libo caused to be inclosed
(perhaps cir. A. U. C. 604). It had been perhaps a bidental (cf. ad Sat.
ii. , 27), or, as others say, the place where the razor of the augur
Nævius was deposited. Near it was the prætor's chair, and the benches
frequented by persons who had private suits, among whom the class of
usurers would be most conspicuous. (Hence Hor. , i. , Epist. xix. , 8,
"Forum putealque Libonis Mandabo siccis. " ii. , Sat. vi. , 35. ) _Puteal
flagellare_, therefore, is taken in its primitive sense to mean, "to
frequent the forum for the purpose of enforcing rigorous payment from
those to whom you _have_ lent money; or the benches of the usurers, in
quest of persons to whom you _may_ lend it on exorbitant interest. "
Cf. Ov. , Remed. , Am. , 561, "Qui _puteal_ Janumque timet, celeresque
Kalendas. " Cic. , Sext. , 8. In its secondary sense, it may apply to the
nightly atrocities of Nero, who used to frequent the forum, violently
assaulting those he met, and outrageously insulting females, not
unfrequently committing robberies and even murder; but having been
soundly beaten one night by a nobleman whose wife he had outraged, he
went ever after attended by gladiators, as a security for his personal
safety; who kept aloof until their services were required. Nero might
well, therefore, be called the "scourge of the Forum," and be said
to leave scars and wales behind him in the scenes of his enormities.
Juvenal (Sat. iii. , 278, _seq.
