Chapter 9

Gracchi).

" II. treats of the decline of Rome, 133-29 B.C. (Temple of Janus closed).

3. Style.

A pretentious and smartly written work abounding in mistakes, contradictions, and misrepresentations of historical truth. It was, however, popular in the Middle Ages on account of its brevity and its rhetorical style. Florus is useful in giving us a short account of events in periods where we have no books of Livy to guide us.

S. JULIUS FRONTINUS, circ. 41-103 A.D.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: FRONTINUS.]

He was _praetor urbanus_ 70 A.D., and in 75 succeeded Cerealis as governor oi Britain, where, as Tacitus tells us, he distinguished himself by the conquest of the Silures: _sustinuit molem Iulius Frontinus, vir magnus, quantum licebat, validamque et pugnacem Siturum gentem armis subegit_: 'Julius Frontinus was equal to the burden, a great man as far as greatness was then possible (i.e. under the jealous rule of Domitian), who subdued by his arms the powerful and warlike tribe of the Silures.'

In 97 he was nominated _curator aquarum_, administrator of the aqueducts of Rome: the closing years of his life were passed in studious retirement at his villa on the Bay of Naples. Cf. Mart. X. lviii.

2. Works.

Two works of his are extant:--

(1) +De Aquis Urbis Romae.+--A treatise on the Roman water-supply, published under Trajan, soon after the death of Nerva, 97 A.D.; a complete and valuable account.

(2) +Strategemata.+--A manual of strategy, in three books, consisting of historical examples derived chiefly from Sallust, Caesar, and Livy.

3. Style.

Simple and concise: 'he shuns the conceits of the period and goes back to the republican authors, of whom (and especially of Caesar's Commentaries) his language strongly reminds us.' --Cruttwell.

As a mark of his unaffected modesty, Pliny (_Ep._ ix. 19) tells us: _vetuit exstrui monimentum: sed quibus verbis? 'impensa monimenta supervacua est: memoria nostri durabit, si vita meruimus_.'

AULUS GELLIUS, circ. 123-175 A.D.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: GELLIUS.]

All that is known about his life is gathered from occasional hints in his own writings. He seems to have spent his early years at Rome, studying under the most famous teachers, first at Rome and afterwards at Athens, and then to have returned to Rome, where he spent the remaining years of his life in literary pursuits and in the society of a large circle of friends.

2. Works.

The +Noctes Atticae+ (so called because it was begun during the long nights of winter in a country house in Attica) in twenty books consists of numerous extracts from Greek and Roman writers on subjects connected with history, philosophy, philology, natural science and antiquities, illustrated by abundant criticisms and discussions. It is, in fact, a commonplace book, and the arrangement of the contents is merely casual, following the course of his reading of Greek and Latin authors. The work is, however, of special value to us from the very numerous quotations from ancient authors preserved by him alone.

3. Style.

His language is sober but full of archaisms, which he much affected (he gives, therefore, no quotations from post-Augustan writers). His style shows the defects of an age in which men had ceased to feel the full meaning of the words they used, and strove to hide the triviality of a subject under obscure phrases and florid expression. Yet, on the whole, he is a very interesting writer, and the last that can in any way be called classical.

'_Vir elegantissimi eloquii et multae ac facundae scientiae._' --St. Augustine, 400 A.D.

QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUS, 65-8 B.C.

1. Important Events in the Life of Horace.

[Sidenote: HORACE.]

B.C. 65. Born at Venusia (_Venosa_) on the confines of Apulia and Lucania. " 53-46. Educated at Rome under the famous _plagosus_ Orbilius. " 46-44. At the University of Athens. " 44-42. Served under Brutus as _tribunus militum_: fought at Philippi. " 42-39. Pardoned by Octavianus and allowed to return to Rome. His poverty compelled him to write verses, prob. _Sat._ I, ii. iii. iv., and some _Epodes_. Through these he obtained the notice of Varius and Vergil, who became his fast friends and " 38. introduced him to Maecenas, the trusted minister of Augustus. " 35. +Satires, Book I+ published. (Journey to Brundisium described, _Sat._ I. v.) " 33. Maecenas bestowed upon him a Sabine farm (about 15 miles N.E. of Tivoli). For fullest description see _Epist._ I. xvi. " 31. +Satires, Book II+, and +Epodes+ published. " 23. +Odes, Books I-III+ published. " 20. +Epistles, Book I+ published. " 17. +Carmen Saeculare+ written at the request of Augustus for the _Ludi Saeculares_. " 13. +Odes, Book IV+ published. " 12. +Epistles, Book II+ published. " 8. Died in the same year as his friend and patron Maecenas.

3. Works.

(1) +Odes+, in four books, and +Epodes+.--The words of Cicero (_pro Archia_ 16) best describe the abiding value of the four Books of the Odes--_Adolescentiam alunt_ (strengthen), _senectutem oblectant, secundas res ornant, adversis perfugium ac solacium praebent, delectant domi, non impediunt foris, pernoctant nobiscum, peregrinantur, rusticantur_. In them we see a poet, as Quintilian says, _verbis felicissime audax_--most happily daring in his use of words and endowed, as Petronius says, with _curiosa felicitas_, a subtle happiness of expression--'what oft was thought but ne'er so well express'd.'

(2) +Satires (Sermones)+ in two Books.--Horace's chief model is Lucilius, whom he wished to adapt to the Augustan age. To touch on political topics was impossible; Horace employed satire to display his own individuality and his own views on various subjects. Book I (his earliest effort) is marred by faults in execution and is often wanting in good taste; but in Book II 'he uses the hexameter to exhibit the semi-dramatic form of easy dialogue, with a perfection as complete as that of Vergil in the stately and serious manner. In reading these Satires we all read our own minds and hearts.' --Mackail.

(3) +The Epistles (Sermones)+ in two Books, and +Ars Poetica+ (_Ep. ad Pisones_).--These represent his most mature production. As a poet Horace now stood without a rival. Life was still full of vivid interest for him, but years (_fallentis semita vitae_) had brought the philosophic mind. 'To teach the true end and wise regulation of life, and to act on character from within, are the motives of the more formal and elaborate epistles.' --Sellar.

The +Ars Poetica+ is a _résumé_ of Greek criticism on the drama.

3. Style.

'With the principal lyric metres, the Sapphic and Alcaic, Horace had done what Vergil had accomplished with the dactylic hexameter, carried them to the highest point of which the foreign Latin tongue was capable.' --Mackail.

'As Vergil is the most idealising exponent of what was of permanent and universal significance in the time, Horace is the most complete exponent of its actual life and movement. He is at once the lyrical poet, with heart and imagination responsive to the deeper meaning and lighter amusements of life, and the satirist, the moralist, and the literary critic of the age.' --Sellar.

JUSTINUS, circ. 150 A.D. (_temp._ Antoninus Pius).

1. Life.

[Sidenote: JUSTINUS.]

We know nothing positively about him, though probably he lived in the age of the Antonines. Teuffel says 'Considering his correct mode of thinking and the style of his preface, we should not like to put him much later than Florus, who epitomised Livy.'

2. Works.

+Epitoma Historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi+, in forty-four Books.--An abridgment of the Universal History of Pompeius Trogus (_temp._ Livy). The title _Historiae Philippicae_ was given to it by Trogus because its main object was to give the history of the Macedonian monarchy, with all its branches, but he allowed himself, like Herodotus, to indulge in such large digressions that it was regarded by many as a Universal History. It was arranged according to nations; it began with Ninus, the Nimrod of legend, and was brought down to about 9 A.D.

3. Style.

Justinus (as he tells us in his Preface) made it his business to form an attractive reading-book--_breve veluti florum corpusculum feci_ (an anthology)--and his chief merit is that he seems to have been a faithful abbreviator.

DECIMUS JUNIUS JUVENALIS, 55-138 A.D.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: JUVENAL.]

Of Juvenal's life very little is certainly known. Thirteen lives of him exist, which are confused and contradictory in detail. From the evidences of the Satires we learn that he lived from early youth at Rome, but went for holidays to Aquinum, a town of the Volscians (where perhaps he was born in the reign of Nero); that he had a small farm at Tibur, and a house in Rome, where he entertained his friends in a modest way; that he had been in Egypt; that he wrote Satires late in life; that he reached his eightieth year, and lived into the reign of Antoninus Pius. He complains frequently and bitterly of his poverty and of the hardships of a dependent's life. In short, the circumstances of his life were very similar to those of Martial, who speaks of Juvenal as a very intimate friend.

The famous inscription at Aquinum--which Duff considers does not refer to the poet but to a wealthy kinsman of his--indicates that he had served in the army as commander of a Dalmatian cohort, and, as one of the chief men of the town, was superintendent of the civic worship paid to Vespasian after his deification.

All the Lives assert that Juvenal was banished to Egypt--Juvenal himself never alludes to this--for offence given to an actor who was high in favour with the reigning Emperor (Hadrian according to Prof. Hardy), and that he died in exile.

2. Works.

+Saturae+, sixteen, grouped in five Books.

Books I-III (Satires 1-9) are sharply divided both in form and substance from Books IV-V (Satires 10-16), which are not satires at all, but moral essays, in the form of letters. The first nine satires present a wonderfully vivid picture of the seamy side of life at Rome at the end of the first century. We must, however, read side by side with them the contemporary Letters of Pliny, in which we find ourselves in a different world from that scourged by the satirist.

'His chief literary qualities are his power of painting lifelike scenes, and his command of brilliant epigrammatic phrase.' --Duff. Nothing, for instance, could surpass his picture of the fall of Sejanus (Sat. x. 56-97). His power of coining phrases is seen in these _sententiae_: _nemo repente fuit turpissimus--expende Hannibalem_: _quot libras in duce summo | invenies_: _maxima debetur puero reverentia_: _mens sana in corpora sano_--which are familiar proverbs among educated men.

Juvenal tells us that he takes all life, all the world, for his text:

_Quidquid agunt homines, Votum, Timor, Ira, Voluptas, Gaudia, Discursus, nostri est farrago libelli_ (the motley subject of my page).--_Sat._ i. 85-6.

TITUS LIVIUS PATAVINUS, circ. 59 B.C.-17 A.D.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: LIVY.]

Livy was born at Patavium (_Padua_) between the years 59 and 57 B.C. Little is known of his life, but his aristocratic sympathies, as seen in his writings, seem to suggest that he was of good family. Padua was a populous and busy place, where opportunities for public speaking were abundant and the public life vigorous; thus Livy was early trained in eloquence, and lived amid scenes of human activity. About 30 B.C. he settled at Rome, where his literary talents secured the patronage and friendship of Augustus. But though a courtier he was no flatterer. 'Titus Livius,' says Tacitus (_Ann._ iv. 34), 'pre-eminently famous for eloquence and truthfulness, extolled Cn. Pompeius in such a panegyric that Augustus called him Pompeianus, and yet this was no obstacle to their friendship.' He returned to his native town before his death, 17 A.D., at the age of about 75.

2. Works.

+History of Rome+ (_Ab urbe condita Libri_), a comprehensive account in 142 Books of the whole History of Rome from the foundation of the City to the death of Drusus, 9 A.D. It is probable that he intended to continue his work in 150 Books, down to the death of Augustus in 14 A.D., the point from which Tacitus starts. The number of Books now extant is 35, about one fourth of the whole number, but we possess summaries (_Periochae_ or _Argumenta_) of nearly the whole work. The division of the History into decades (sets of ten Books), though merely conventional, is convenient. According to this arrangement the Books now extant are:

Books I-X, 754-293 B.C., to nearly the close of the Third Samnite War.

Books XXI-XXX, 219-201 B.C., the narrative of the Second Punic War.

Books XXXI-XLV, 201-167 B.C., describe the Wars in Greece and Macedonia, and end with the triumph of Aemilius Paulus after Pydna, 168 B.C.

3. Style.

His style is characterised by variety, liveliness, and picturesqueness. 'As a master of style Livy is in the first rank of historians. He marks the highest point which the enlarged and enriched prose of the Augustan age reached just before it began to fall into decadence. . . . The periodic structure of Latin prose, which had been developed by Cicero, is carried by him to an even greater complexity and used with a greater daring and freedom. . . . His imagination never fails to kindle at great actions; it is he, more than any other author, who has impressed the great soldiers and statesmen of the Republic on the imagination of the world.' --Mackail.

4. The Speeches.

'The spirit in which he writes History is well illustrated by the Speeches. These, in a way, set the tone of the whole work. He does not affect in them to reproduce the substance of words actually spoken, or even to imitate the colour of the time in which the speech is laid. He uses them rather as a vivid and dramatic method of portraying character and motive.' --Mackail. 'Everything,' says Quintilian (X. i. 101), 'is perfectly adapted both to the circumstances and personages introduced.'

5. The Purpose of his History.

The first ten books of Livy were being written about the same time as the _Aeneid_; both Vergil and Livy had the same patriotic purpose, 'to celebrate the growth, in accordance with a divine dispensation, of the Roman Empire and Roman civilisation.' --Nettleship. Livy, however, brought into greater prominence the moral causes which contributed to the growth of the Empire. In his preface to Book I, § 9, he asks his readers to consider _what have been the life and habits of the Romans, by aid of what men and by what talents at home and in the field their Empire has been gained and extended_. Only by virtue and manliness, justice and piety, was the dominion of the world achieved.

'In ancient Rome he sees his ideal realised, and _romanus_ hence signifies in his language all that is noble. He thus involuntarily appears partial to Rome, and unjust to her enemies, notably to the Samnites and Hannibal.' --Teuffel.

'As the title of _Gesta Populi Romani_ was given to the _Aeneid_ on its appearance, so the _Historiae ab Urbe Condita_ might be called, with no less truth, a funeral eulogy--_consummatio totius vitae et quasi funebris laudatio_ (Sen. _Suas._ VI. 21)--delivered, by the most loving and most eloquent of her sons, over the grave of the great Republic.' --Mackail.

M. ANNAEUS LUCANUS, 39-65 A.D.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: LUCAN.]

+Important Events in the Life of Lucan.+

A.D. 39. Born at Corduba (_Cordova_) on the R. Baetis (_Guadalquivir_). " 40. His father migrates with his family to Rome. " 54-68. Nero Emperor. " 55. Lucan under Cornutus, the tutor also of Persius. " 57-9. At the University of Athens. " 60. Wins the favour of Nero, who begins to hate Seneca. " 61. Lucan quaestor: famous as a reciter and pleader. " 62. Disgrace of Seneca. +Pharsalia I.-III.+ published. Death of Persius. " 63. Marries Polla Argentaria, a marriage of affection. " 64. Nero, from jealousy, forbids Lucan to publish poems or to recite them. " 65. Pisonian conspiracy discovered. Lucan compelled to die.

Lucan was a nephew of M. Annaeus Novatus (the Gallio of Acts xviii. 12-17), and of Seneca, the philosopher and tutor of Nero. 'Rhetoric and Stoic dogma were the staple of his mental training. For a much-petted, quick-witted youth, plunged into such a society as that of Rome in the first century A.D., hardly any training could be more mischievous. Puffed up with presumed merits and the applause of the lecture-room and the _salon_, he became a shallow rhetorician, devoted to phrase-making and tinsel ornament, and ready to write and declaim on any subject in verse or prose at the shortest notice.' --Heitland. Silenced by Nero, in an enforced retirement--probably in the stately gardens spoken of by Juvenal vii. 79-80 _contentus fama iaceat Lucanus in hortis Marmoreis--Lucan may repose in his park adorned with statues and find fame enough_--he brooded over his wrongs, and despairing of any other way of restoration to public life, joined the ill-fated conspiracy of Piso.

2. Works.

The +Pharsalia+ (or _De Bello Civili_), an epic poem in ten Books, from the beginning of the Civil War down to the point where Caesar is besieged in Alexandria, 49-48 B.C. His narrative thus runs parallel to Caesar's De _Bello Civili_, but it contains some valuable additional matter and gives a faithful picture of the feeling general among the nobility of the day.

3. Style.

'To Lucan's rhetorical instincts and training, and the influence of the recitations which Juvenal _Sat._ iii. tells us were so customary and such a nuisance in his day, are due the great defects of the _Pharsalia_. We see the sacrifice of the whole to the parts, neglect of the matter in an over-studious regard for the manner, a self-conscious tone appealing rather to an audience than to a reader, venting itself in apostrophes, digressions, hyperbole (over-drawn description), episodes and epigrams, an unhappy laboriousness that strains itself to be first-rate for a moment, but leaves the poem second-rate for ever.' --Heitland.

The general effect of Lucan's verse is one of steady monotony, due to a want of variety in the pauses and in the ending of lines, and a too sparing use of elision, by which Vergil was able to regulate the movement of lines and make sound and sense agree.

'In spite of its immaturity and bad taste the poem compels admiration by its elevation of thought and sustained brilliance of execution; it contains passages of lofty thought and real beauty, such as the dream of Pompeius, or the character which Cato gives of Pompeius, and is full of quotations which have become household words; such as, _In se magna ruunt--Stat magni nominis umbra--Nil actum reputans si quid superesset agendum_ (a line which rivals Caesar's energy).'--Mackail.

The brief and balanced judgment of Quintilian (_Inst. Orat._ X. i. 90) sums up Lucan in words which suggest at once his chief merits and defects as a poet: _Lucanus ardens et concitatus et sententiis clarissimus et magis oratoribus quam poetis imitandus--Lucan has fire and point, is very famous for his maxims, and indeed is rather a model for orators than poets_.

GAIUS LUCILIUS, circ. 170-103 B.C.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: LUCILIUS.]

Lucilius was born in the Latin town of Suessa of the Aurunci, in Campania, of a well-to-do equestrian family. Velleius tells us that the sister of Lucilius was grandmother to Pompeius, and that Lucilius served in the cavalry under Scipio in the Numantine war, 134 B.C. Lucilius lived on very intimate terms with Scipio Africanus Minor and Laelius, and died at Naples (103 B.C.), where he was honoured with a public funeral.

2. Works.

+Saturae+ in thirty Books, in various metres. Fragments only are extant.

'After Terence he is the most distinguished and the most important in his literary influence among the friends of Scipio. The form of literature which he invented and popularised, that of familiar poetry, was one which proved singularly suited to the Latin genius. He speaks of his own works under the name of _Sermones_ (talks)--a name which was retained by his great successor and imitator Horace; but the peculiar combination of metrical form with wide range of subject and the pedestrian style of ordinary prose received in popular usage the name _Satura_ (mixture).'--Mackail.

_Satura quidem tota nostra est, in qua primus insignem laudem adeptus Lucilius._ --Quint. X. i. 93.

'The chief social vices which Lucilius attacks are those which reappear in the pages of the later satirists. They are the two extremes to which the Roman temperament was most prone: rapacity and meanness in gaining money, vulgar ostentation and coarse sensuality in using it.' --Sellar.

Juvenal says of him (_Sat._ i. 165-7):

'When old Lucilius seems to draw his sword and growls in burning ire, the hearer blushes for shame, his conscience is chilled for his offences, and his heart faints for secret sins.'

T. LUCRETIUS CARUS, circ. 99-55 B.C.

1. Life.

[Sidenote: LUCRETIUS.]

Very little is known of his life. The subiect of his poem prevented him from telling his own history as Catullus, Horace, and Ovid have done, and his contemporaries seldom refer to him. The name Lucretius suggests that he was descended from one of the most ancient patrician houses of Rome, famous in the early annals of the Republic. He was evidently a man of wealth and position, but he deliberately chose the life of contemplation, and lived apart from the ambitions and follies of his day. Donatus, in his life of Vergil, tells us that Lucretius died on the day on which Vergil assumed the _toga virilis_, Oct. 15, 55 B.C.

2. Works.

The +De Rerum Natura+, a didactic poem in hexameter verse in six Books. The poem was left unfinished at his death, and Munro supports the tradition that Cicero both corrected it and superintended its publication. The object of the poem is to deliver men from the fear of death and the terrors of superstition by the new knowledge of Nature:

_Hunc igitur terrorem animi tenebrasque necessest Non radii solis neque lucida tela diei Discutiant, sed naturae species ratioque._

_This terror of the soul, therefore, and this darkness must be dispelled, not by the rays of the sun or the bright shafts of day, but by the outward aspect and harmonious plan of nature._ --S.

The source of these terrors is traced to the general ignorance of certain facts in Nature--ignorance, namely, of the constitution and condition of our minds and bodies, of the means by which the world came into existence and is still maintained, and, lastly, of the causes of many natural phenomena. Thus:

Books I and II uphold the principles of the Atomic Theory as held by Epicurus (_fl._ 300 B.C.).