Chapter 65

STATE OF PHILOSOPHICAL AND RELIGIOUS THOUGHT DURING THE PERIOD OF THE ANTONINES--CONCLUSION.

During the second century after Christ we have the remarkable spectacle of the renaissance of Greek literature. The eloquence which had so long been silent now was heard again in Dio Chrysostom, the delicate artillery of Attic wit was revived by Lucian, the dignity of sublime thought was upheld by Arrian and Marcus Aurelius. It should be remarked that the Greeks had never quite discontinued the art of eloquence. When their own political independence ended, they carried their talents into other lands, into Egypt, India, Asia Minor, sowing colonies of intelligence wherever they went; but the chief place to which they flocked was Rome. At Rome the hold they gained was such that even tyranny itself could not loosen it. Their light spirits and plastic nature made them adapt themselves to every fashion without difficulty and without regret; even under Tiberius or Domitian there was always something for a cultured Greek to do. [1]

Rhetoric was the inheritance of the dethroned Greek nation, and they clung to it with all the fondness of gratitude. Long after the pacification of the world had destroyed all the subject-matter of oratory, they cherished the form of it, and practised it with a zeal proportioned to its worthlessness. Even in her best days, as we know from Thucydides, Greece had been a victim to fine talking; the words of her delicious language seemed by their mere sound to have power over those that used them; and now that patriotism had ceased to inspire her orators, they naturally sought in the splendour of the Asiatic style an equivalent for the chaste beauties of ancient national eloquence. There were two classes of Greeks at this period who effected in no small degree the general spread of culture. These were the rhetors and the sophists; properly speaking distinct, but often confounded under the general name of sophist.

The rhetors proper have been already described. We need only notice here the gradually increasing insignificance of the themes they chose. In the Claudian era the points discussed were either historical, mythical, or legal. All had some reference, however distant, to actual pleading before a court of law. But now even this element of reality has disappeared. The poetical readings which had been the fashion under Domitian gave place to rhetorical _ostentations_ which were popular in proportion to their frivolity or misplaced ingenuity. The heroes of Marathon, [2] the sages of ancient Greece, had once been the objects of praise. They were now made the objects of derision and invective. [3] Speeches against Socrates, Achilles, or Homer, and in favour of Busiris, were commonly delivered, in which every argument was acutely misapplied, and every established belief acutely combated. Panegyrics of cities, gods, or heroes, had been a favourite exercise of the orator's art. Now these panegyrics were expended upon the most contemptible themes, _infames materiae_ as they were called. Fronto sang the praises of idleness, of fever, of the vomit, of gout, of smoke, of dust; Lucian, in a speech still extant, of the fly; others of the ass, the mouse, the flea! Such were the detestable travesties into which Greek eloquence had sunk. Roman statesmen frequently displayed their talents in this way; but as a rule they declaimed in Greek. These orations were delivered in a basilica or theatre, and for two days previously criers ranged through the city, advertising the inhabitants of the lecturer's name and subject.

Other aspirants to fame, gifted with less refinement, paraded the streets in rags and filth, and railed sardonically at all the world, mingling flattery of the crowd with abuse of the great, and of all the restrictions of society. These were the street preachers of cynicism, who found their trade by no means an unprofitable one. Often, after a few years of squalid abstinence and quack philosophy, they had picked up enough to enable them to shave their beards, don the robes of good society, and end their days in the vicious self-indulgence which was the original inspirer of their tirades.

Every great city was full of these caterers for itching ears, the one sort fashionable, the other vulgar, but both equally acceptable to their audience. Some more ambitious spirits, of whom Apuleius is the type, not content with success in a single town, moved from place to place, challenging the chief sophist in each city to enter the lists against them. If he declined the contest, his popularity was at an end for ever. If he accepted it, the risk was enormous, lest a people tired of his eloquence might prefer the sound of a new voice, and thus force on him the humiliation of surrendering his crown and his titles to another. For in their delirious enthusiasm the cities of Greece and Asia lavished money, honours, immunities, and statues, upon the mountebank orators who pleased them. Emperors saluted them as equals; the people chose them for ambassadors; until their conceit rose to such a height as almost to pass the bounds of belief. [4] And their morals, it will readily be guessed, did not rise above their intellectual capacities. Instead of setting an example of virtue, they were below the average in licentiousness, avarice, and envy. Effeminate in mind, extravagant in purse, they are perhaps the most contemptible of all those who have set themselves up as the instructors of mankind.

But all were not equally debased. Side by side with this truckling to popular favour was a genuine attempt to preach the simple truths of morality and religion. For near a century it had been recognised that certain elements of philosophy should be given forth to the world. Even the Stoics, according to Lactantius, [5] had declared that women and slaves were capable of philosophical pursuits. Apuleius, conspicuous in this department also, was a distinguished itinerant teacher of wisdom. Lucian at one time lectured in this way. But the most eloquent and natural of all was Dio Chrysostom, who, though a Greek, is so pleasing a type of the best popular morals of the time, that we may, perhaps, be excused for referring to him. He was a native of Bithynia, but in consequence of some disagreement with his countrymen, he came to Rome during the reign of Domitian. Having offended the tyrant by his freedom of speech, he was compelled to flee for his life. For years he wandered through Greece and Macedonia in the guise of a beggar, doing menial work for his bread, but often asked to display his eloquence for the benefit of those with whom he came in contact. Once while present at the Olympic festival and silently standing among the throng, he was recognised as one who could speak well, and compelled to harangue the assembled multitudes. He chose for his subject the praises of Jupiter Olympius, which he set forth with such majestic eloquence that all who heard him were deeply moved, and a profound silence, broken only by sobs of emotion, reigned throughout the vast crowd. Other stories are told showing the effect of his words. On one occasion he recalled a body of soldiers to their allegiance; on another he quelled a sedition; on a third he rebuked the mob of Alexandria for its immoral conduct, and, strange as it may seem, was listened to without interruption. When Domitian's death allowed him to return to Rome, he maintained the same courageous attitude. Trajan often asked his advice, and he discoursed to him freely on the greatness of royalty and its duties. He seems to have held a lofty view of his mission; he calls it a _proppaesis iera_, [6] or holy proclamation, and he speaks of himself as a _prophaetaes alaethestatos taes athanatou physeus_. [7]

What he taught, therefore, was a popular moral doctrine, based upon some of the simpler theories of philosophy, such as were easily intelligible to the unlearned, and admitted of rhetorical amplification and illustration by mythology and anecdote. Considered in one way, this was a great step in advance from the total neglect of the people by the earlier teachers of virtue. It shows the more humane spirit which was slowly leavening the once proud and exclusive possessors of intellectual culture. By exciting a general interest in the great questions of our being, it paved the way for a readier reception of the Gospel among those classes to whom it was chiefly preached. But at the same time by its want of authority, depending as it did solely on the eloquence or benevolence of the individual sophist, it prevented the possibility of anything like a systematic amelioration of the people's character. This side of the question, however, is too wide to be more than alluded to here, and it is besides foreign to our present subject. We must turn to consider the state of cultured thought on matters philosophical and religious; a point of great importance as bearing on the decline and speedy extinction of literary effort in Rome.

To begin with philosophy. We have seen that Rome had gradually become a centre of free thought, as it had become a centre of vice and luxury. The prejudices against philosophy complained of by Cicero, and even by Seneca, had now almost vanished. Instead of being indifferent, men took to it so readily as to excite the fears of more than one emperor. Nero had persecuted philosophers; Vespasian had removed them from Rome, Domitian from Italy. After Domitian's death, they returned with greater influence than ever. Hadrian and Antoninus were favourable to them. Aurelius was himself one of their number. Philosophy had had its martyrs; [8] and, after suffering, it had turned towards proselytism. The provinces had embraced it with enthusiasm. The narrow prejudice which had envied their intellectual culture [9] now envied their moral advancement; but equally without effect. Long before this, Musonius Rufus, an aristocratic Stoic, had admitted slaves to his lectures, [10] and at the risk of his life had preached peace to the armies of Vitellius and Vespasian. [11] And this wide-spread movement had, as we have seen, been continued by men like Dio, and later still by Apuleius.

But by thus gaining in width it lost greatly in depth. There is a danger when teaching becomes mainly practical of its losing sight of the fundamental laws amid the multitude of details, and attaching itself to trifles. There is a superstition in philosophy as well as in religion. Epictetus gives directions for the trimming of the beard in a tone as serious as if he were speaking of the _summum bonum_. And stoicism from the very first, by its absurd paradox that all faults are equal, obviously fell into this very snare, which, the moment it was popularized, could not fail with disastrous effect to come to the surface.

Again, the intrusive element of rhetoric greatly impeded strength of argument. In all practical teaching the point of the lesson is known beforehand; it is the manner of enforcing it that alone excites interest. Thus philosophy and rhetoric, which had hitherto been implacable foes, became reconciled in the furtherance of a common object. Seneca had affected to despise learning; Gellius and Favorinus, on the contrary, delighted in its minutest subtleties. Philosophers now declaimed like rhetoricians, and indifferently in either language. But in proportion as they addressed a larger public, it became more necessary to use the Greek, which was now the language of the civilized world. Favorinus, Epictetus, M. Aurelius himself, all wrote and generally spoke in it.

The reconciliation between philosophy and religion was not less remarkable than that between philosophy and rhetoric. It seemed as if all the separate domains of thought were gradually being fused into a kind of popular moral culture. The old philosophers had as a rule kept morals altogether distinct from religion. Epictetus and Aurelius make the two altogether identical. The old philosophers had kept away from the temples, or, if they went, had taken pains to mock the ceremonies they performed and to announce that their conformity was a pure matter of custom. The new philosophers were strictly regular in their religious worship, and not only observed and respected, but earnestly defended the entire popular cult. The nobler side of this "reconciliation" is shown in Plutarch, the grosser and more material side in Apuleius; but in both there is no mistaking its reality. Plutarch's idea of philosophy is "to attain a truer knowledge of God." [12] Philostratus, when asked what wisdom was, replied, "the science of prayers and sacrifices." [13] These men sought their knowledge of the Divine, not, as did Aristotle, in speculative thought, but in the collecting and explaining of legends. Stoicism had sought by compromise after compromise to satisfy the general craving for a religious philosophy reconcilable with the popular superstition. Its great exponents had stretched the elasticity of their system to the uttermost. They had given to their Supreme Being the name of Jove, they had admitted all the other deities of the Pantheon as emanations or attributes of the Supreme, they had justified augury by their theory of fate, they had explained away all the inconsistencies and immoralities of the popular creed by an elaborate system of allegory; but yet they had failed to content the religious masses, who divined as by an instinct the hollow and artificial character of this fabric of compromise. Hence there arose a new school more suited to the requirements of the time, which gave itself out as Platonist. This new philosophy was anything but a genuine reproduction of the thought of the great Athenian. With some of his more popular and especially his oriental conceptions, it combined a mass of alien importations drawn from foreign cults, and in particular from Egypt.

We read how Juvenal deplores the inroads of Eastern superstition into Rome. [14] Syria, Babylon, and Asia Minor had added their mysteries to the Roman ceremonial. Astrologers were consulted by small and great; the Galli or eunuch-priests of Cybele were among the most influential bodies in Rome; and the impure goddess Isis was universally worshipped. [15] Egypt, which in classic times had been held as the stronghold of bestial superstition, was now spoken of as a "Holy Land," and "the temple of the universe." [16] The Stoics had studied in books, or by questioning their own mind; the Platonists sought for wisdom by travelling all over the world. Not content with the rites already known, they raked up obscure ceremonies and imported strange mysteries. Reflection and dialectic were no longer sufficient to ensure knowledge; asceticism, devotion, and initiation, were necessary for divine science. The idea broached by Plato in the _Timaeus_ of intermediate beings between the gods and man, seemed to meet their requirements; and accordingly they at once adopted it. An entire hierarchy of _daimones_ was imagined, and on this a system of quasi-religious philosophy was founded, of which Apuleius is the popular exponent.

The main tenets of this, the last attempt to explain the mystery of the universe which gained currency in Rome, were as follows--it will be seen how completely it had passed from philosophy to theosophy:--The supreme being is one, eternal, absolute, indescribable, and incomprehensible; but may be envisaged by the soul for a moment like a flash of lightning. [17] The great gods are of two kinds, visible, as the sun and stars, and invisible, as Jupiter and the rest; both these are inaccessible to human communion. Then come the daemons in their order, and with these man holds intercourse. Plutarch had adopted a tentative and incomplete form of this doctrine, _e.g._ he denied the visibility of Socrate's daemon, and spoke of the death of Pan. But Apuleius is much more thorough-going; he supposes all the daemons to be at once immortal and visible. Each great god has a daemon or double, who loves to use his name; and all the stories of the gods are in reality true of their daemons. In a moral point of view, daemons are of all characters--good and bad, cheerful and gloomy. [18] Their interventions, which are perpetual, explain what the stories could not explain, viz. the idea of Providence. In fact the whole current theory of the supernatural is easily explained when the existence of these intermediate beings is admitted. Aware that this theory wandered far from Roman ideas, Apuleius tries to reconcile it with the national religion by calling the daemons _genii_, _lares_, and _manes_, which are true Italian conceptions. To a certain extent the device succeeded; at any rate the new philosophy resulted in making devotees of the higher classes, as superstition had long since done with the people.

It seems incredible that any one who had studied the Platonic dialogues should have fancied theories like these to be their essence. Nevertheless, so it was. Men found in them what they wished to find, and perhaps no greater witness could be given to the immense fertility of Plato's thought. However, when these conceptions came to be imported into philosophy, it is clear that philosophy no longer knew herself. She had become hopelessly unable to cope with the problems of actual life; henceforth there was nothing left but the rigours of the ascetic or the ecstacy of the mystic. Into these still later paths we shall not follow it. Apuleius is the last Roman who, writing in the Latin language, pretends to succeed to the line of thinkers of whom Varro, Cicero, and Seneca, were the chief. It is true he is immeasurably below them. In his effeminate union of licentiousness and mysticism he is far removed from the masculine, if inconsistent, practical wisdom of Seneca, further still from the glowing patriotism and lofty aspirations of Cicero. Still as a type of his age, of that country which already exercised, and was soon to exercise in a far higher degree, an influence on the thought of the world, [19] he is well worthy of attentive study.

We may now, in conclusion, very shortly review the main features in the history of Roman literature from Ennius, its first conscious originator, until the close of the Antonine period.

The end which Ennius had set before him was two-fold, to familiarise his countrymen with Greek culture, and to enlighten their minds from error. And to this double object the great masters of Roman literature remained always faithful. With more or less power and success, Terence, Lucilius, the tragedians, and even the mimists, elevated while they amused their popular audiences. In the last century of the Republic, literature still addressed, in the form of oratory, the great masses to whom scarce any other culture was accessible. But in poetry and philosophy it had broken with them, and thus showed the first sign of withdrawal from that thoroughly national mission with which the old father of Latin poetry had set out. Yet this very exclusiveness was not without its use. It enabled the best writers to aim at a far higher ideal of perfection than would have been possible for a popular author, however scrupulously he might strive for excellence. It enabled the best minds to concentrate their efforts upon all that was most strictly national because most strictly aristocratic, and thus to form those great representative works of Roman thought and style which are found in the writings of Cicero and Livy, and the poetry of Horace and Virgil. The responsibility which the possession of culture involves was now acknowledged only within narrow limits. The motto, "pingui nil mihi cum populo," was strictly followed, and all the best literature addressed only to a select circle. Meanwhile the people, for whom tragedy and comedy had done something, however little, that was good, neglected by the literary world, debased by bribery and the coarse pleasures of conquest, sunk lower and lower until they had become the brutal, sensual mob, inaccessible to all higher influences, which satirists and philosophers paint in such hideous colours, but which they did nothing and wrote nothing to improve. Then came the era of the decline, in which, for the first time, we observe that literature has lost its supremacy. It is still cultivated with enthusiasm, and numbers many more votaries than it had ever done before; nevertheless, its influence is disputed, and with success, by other forces; by tyranny in the first place, by a defiant philosophy which set itself against aesthetic culture in the second, and by revived and daily increasing superstition in the third. This is the beginning of the people's retaliation on those who should have enlightened them. In vain do emperors issue edicts for the suppression of foreign rites; in vain do courtly satirists or fierce declaimers complain that Rome will not be satisfied with ancestral beliefs and ancestral virtues. The people are asserting themselves in the sphere of thought, as they had asserted themselves in the sphere of politics ages before. But the difference between the two peoples was immense. The one had consisted of virtuous peasants and industrious tradesmen, working for generations to attain what they knew to be their right; the other was formed of slaves, of freedmen, many of them foreigners, and others engaged in occupations by no means honourable; of all that motley multitude who lived on Caesar's rations and spent their days in idleness, in the circus, and in crime. Rotten in its highest circles, equally rotten in its lowest, society could no longer be regenerated by any of the forces then known to it. The national superstitions, out of which literature had at first emerged, were replaced by cosmopolitan superstitions of an infinitely worse kind, which threatened to engulf it at its close, and against which in the persons of such men as Seneca, Juvenal, and Tacitus, it strove for a while with convulsive vigour to make head. But these great spirits only arrested, they could not avert, the inevitable decay. Where public morals are corrupt, where national life is diseased, it is impossible that literature can show a healthy life. The despair that has taken possession of men's souls, which sheds a misanthropic gloom over the writings of the elder Pliny and embitters even the noble mind of Tacitus, results from a conviction that things are incurably wrong, and from a feeling that there is no conceivable remedy. Men of feebler mould strive to forget themselves in exciting pleasures, as Statius and Martial; or in courtly society, as the younger Pliny; or in fond study of the past, as Quintilian; or in minute and pedantic erudition, as Aulus Gellius. The literature of the Silver Age is throughout conscious of its powerlessness; and this consciousness deadens it into tame acquiescence or galls it into hysterical effort, according to the time and temperament of the author. Pliny the younger and Quintilian alone show the happily-balanced disposition of the Golden Age; but what they gain in classic finish they lose in human interest. The decay of Greece had been insignificant, pretty but paltry; the decay of Rome on the other hand is unlovely but colossal. Perhaps in native strength none of her earlier authors equal Juvenal and Tacitus; none certainly exceed them. But they are the last barriers that stem the tide. After them the flood has already rushed in, and before long comes the collapse. In Suetonius and Florus we already see the pioneers of a pigmy race; in Gellius, Fronto, and Apuleius, they are present in all their uncouth dwarfishness. Meanwhile the clamours of the world for guidance grow louder and louder, and there is no one great enough or bold enough to respond to them. The good emperor would do so if he could; but in his perplexity he looks this way and that, bringing into one focus all the cults and ceremonies of the known world, in the vain hope that by indiscriminate piety he may avert the calamities under which his empire groans. But nothing is of any avail. The barbarians without, the pestilence within, decimate his subjects, the hostile gods seem to mock his goodness, and the simple people who look up to him as their tutelary power wonder hopelessly why he cannot save them. And thus on all sides the incapacity of the world to right itself is made clearer and clearer. The gross darkness that had been once partly put to flight by the light of Greek genius when philosophy rose upon the world, and once again had been retarded by the heroic examples of Roman conduct and Roman wisdom, now closed murkily over the whole world. It was indeed time that a new order of thought should arise, which should recreate the dead matter and bring out of it a new and more enduring principle of life, which should give the past its meaning and the future its hope; and, in especial, should reveal to literature its true end, the enlightenment and elevation, not of one class nor of one nation, but of every heart and every intellect that can be made to respond to its influence among all the nations of the earth.

APPENDIX.

A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF ROMAN LITERATURE, FROM LIVIUS TO THE DEATH OF M. AURELIUS. [1]

B.C. 240 Livius begins to exhibit. 239 Ennius born. 235 Naevius begins to exhibit. 234 Cato born. 225 Fabius Pictor served in the Gallic War. 219 Pacuvius born. 218 Cincius Alimentus described the passage of Hannibal into Italy. 217 Cato begins to be known. 216 Fabius Pictor sent as ambassador to Delphi. 207 The poem on the victory of Sena entrusted to Livius. 204 Cato quaestor; brings Ennius to Rome. 201 Naevius dies (?). 191 Cato military tribune. 190 Cincius still writes. 189 Ennius goes with Fulvius into Aetolia. 185 Terence born. [2] 184 Cato censor. Plautus dies. 179 Caecilius flourished. 173 Ennius wrote the twelfth book of the _Annals_. 170 Accius born. 169 Ennius dies. Cato's speech _pro lege Voconia_. 168 Caecilius dies. 166 Terence's _Andria_. 165 Terence's _Hecyra_. 163 Terence's _Hautontimorumenos_. 161 Terence's _Eunuchus_ and _Phormio_. 160 Terence's _Adelphoe_. 159 Terence dies. 154 Pacuvius flourished. 151 Albinus, the consul, writes history (Gell. xi. 8). 150 Cato finishes the _Origines_. 149 Cato, aged 85, accuses Galba. Dies in the same year. C. Calpurnius Piso Frugi, the historian. 148 Lucilius born. 146 Cassius Hemina flourished. C. Fannius, the historian, serves at Carthage. 142 Antonius, the orator, born. 140 Crassus, the orator, born. Accius, aged 30, Pacuvius, aged 80, exhibit together. 134 Sempronius Asellio served at Numantia. Lucilius begins to write. 123 Caelius Antipater flourished. 119 Crassus accuses Carbo. 116 Varro born. 115 Hortensius born. 111 Crassus and Scaevola quaestors. [3] 109 Atticus born. 107 Crassus tribune. 106 Cicero born. 103 The Tereus of Accius. Death of Turpilius. 102 Furius Bibaculus born at Cremona. 100 Aelius Stilo. 98 Antonius defends Aquillius. 95 First public appearance of Hortensius. Lucretius born (?). 92 Crassus censor. Opilius teaches rhetoric. 91 Crassus dies. Pomponius flourished. 90 Scaurus flourished. 89 Cicero serves under the consul Pompeius. 88 Cicero hears Philo and Molo at Rome. Rutilius resident at Mitylene. Plotius Gallus first Latin teacher of Rhetoric. 87 Antonius slain. Sisenna the historian. Catullus born (?). 86 Sallust born. 82 Varro of Atax born. Calvus born. 81 Cicero _pro Quinctio_. Valerius Cato Grammaticus. Otacilius, first freedman who attempts history. 80 _Pro Roscio._ 79 Cicero at Athens; hears Antiochus and Zeno. 78 Cicero hears Molo at Rhodes. 77 Cicero returns to Rome. 76 Asinius Pollio born (?). 75 Cicero quaestor in Sicily. 74 Cicero again in Rome. 70 _Divinatio_ and _Actio I. in Verrem_. Virgil born. 69 Cicero aedile. 67 Varro wins a naval crown under Pompey in the Piratic War (Plin. _N. H._ xvi. 4). 66 Cicero praetor. _Pro lege Manilia. Pro Cluentio._ M. Antonius Gnipho flourished. 65 _Pro Cornelia._ Horace born. 64 _In toga candida._ 63 Consular orations of Cicero. _Pro Murena._ 62 _Pro P. Sulla._ 61 Annaeus Seneca born. 59 Livy born(?). Aelius Tubero with Cicero in Asia. _Pro A. Thermo. Pro L. Flacco._ 58 Cicero goes into exile. 57 Cicero recalled. Calidius a good speaker. 56 _Pro Sextio. In Vatinium. De Provinciis Consularibus._ 55 _In Calpurnium Pisonem. De Oratore._ Virgil assumes the _toga virilis_. 54 _Pro Vatinio. Pro Scauro. De Republica._ 52 _Pro Milone._ Lucretius dies(?). [4] 51 Cicero proconsul in Cilicia. 50 Death of Hortensius. Sallust expelled from the senate. 49 Cicero at Rome. Varro lieutenant of Pompey in Spain. 48 Lenaeus satirizes Sallust. Cicero in Italy. 47 Cicero at Brundisium. Hyginus brought to Rome by Caesar. Catullus still living (C. 52). 46 The _Brutus_ written. Calvus dies. Sallust praetor. _Pro Marcello. Pro Ligario._ 45 Cicero's _Orator_. _Pro Deiolaro._ 44 The first four Philippics. Death of Caesar. 43 The later Philippics. Death of Cicero. Birth of Ovid. 42 Horace at Philippi. 40 Cornelius Nepos flourished. Perhaps Hor. Sat. i. 2. Epod. xiii. 39 Ateius Philologus born at Athens. Perhaps Virg. Ecl. vi. viii. Hor. Od. ii. 7. Epod iv. 38 Perhaps Ecl. vii. Hor. Sat. i. 3. 37 Varro (aet. 80) writes _de Re Rustica._ Perh. Ecl. x. Sat. i. 5 and 6. Epod. v. 36 Cornelius Severus(?) Hor. Sat. i. 8, 35 Bavius dies. Hor. Sat. i. 4, 9, 10. 34 Sallust dies. Sat. ii. 2. Epod. iii. 33 Sat. ii. 3. Epod. xi. xiv. 32 Atticus dies. Sat. ii. 4, 5. Epod. vii. 31 Messala consul. Sat. ii. 6. Epod. i. and ix. 30 Gallus made praefect of Egypt. Cassius Severus dies. Tibullus El. i. 3. The _Georgics_ published. Hor. Sat. ii. 7, 8, and perhaps 1, Epod ii. 29 Livy writing his first book. Propertius I. 6. 28 Varro dies. 27 Od. i. 35. Vitruvius writing his work. 26 Gallus dies (aet. 40). Second book of Propertius published (?). [5] 25 Livy's first book completed before this year. Hor. Od. ii. 4. 24 Quintil. Varus dies (= the poet of Cremona, mentioned in the ninth Eclogue [?]). 23 The first three books of the Odes published. 22 Marcellus dies. Virgil reads the sixth Aeneid to Augustus and Livia. Third book of Propertius (?). 21 Hor. writes Ep. i. 20 (aet. 44). 20 First book of Epistles. 19 Virgil dies at Brundisium. His epitaph:

"Mantua me genuit: Calabri rapuere: tenet nunc Parthenope: cecini pascua rura duces."

Tibullus dies. Domitius Marsus writes. 18 Livy working at his fifty-ninth book. 17 Porcius Latro. The _Carmen Saeculare_. Varius and Tucca edit the Aeneid. 16 Aemilius Macer of Verona dies. Od. iv. 9, to Lollius. 15 Death of Propertius. Victories of Drusus. Od. iv. 4. 14 The fourth book of the Odes(?). 13 Cestius of Smyrna teaches rhetoric. 12 Death of Agrippa. 11 The Epistle to Augustus (Ep. ii. 1). 10 Passienus and Hyginus Polyhistor. 9 Ovid's _Amores_. 8 Death of Horace. 7 Birth of Seneca (?). 6 Albucius Silo a professor of rhetoric. 5 Tiro, Cicero's freedman, dies (aet. 100). 4 Porcius Latro commits suicide. Ovid now in his fortieth year. 2 Ovid's _Art of Love_.

A.D. 1 The _Remedium Amoris_. 2 Velleius Paterculus serves under C. Caesar. 4 Pollio dies. Velleius serves with Tiberius in Germany. 7 Velleius quaestor. 8 Verrius Flaccus, the grammarian, flourished. Ovid banished to Tomi, in December (Tr. 1, 10, 3).

"_Aut hanc me gelidi tremerem cum mense Decembris Scribentem mediis Adria vidita quis._"

9 The _Ibis_ of Ovid. 11 Death of Messala. [6] 12 The _Tristia_ finished. 13 The Epistles from Pontus were being written. 14 Death of Augustus. Velleius praetor. 18 Death of Ovid at 60; of Livy at 76. Valerius Maximus accompanied Sex. Pompeius to Asia. 19 The elder Seneca writes his "recollections." 24 Cassius Severus in exile. Pliny the elder born (?). 25 Death of Cremutius Cordus. Votienus banished. 26 Haterius flourished. 30 Asinius Gallus imprisoned. 31 Valerius Maximus wrote ix. 11, 4 (_extern._), soon after the death of Sejanus. 33 Death of Cassius Severus the orator. His works proscribed. Death of Asinius Gallus. 34 Persius born. 40 Lucan brought to Rome. 41 Seneca's _de Ira_. Exile of Seneca at the close of this year. 42 Asconius Pedianus flourished. 43 Martial born. 45 Domitius Afer flourished. 48 Remmius Palaemon in vogue as a grammarian. 49 Seneca recalled from exile, and made Nero's tutor. 56 Seneca's _de Clementia_. 57 Probus Berytius a celebrated grammarian. 59 Death of Domitius Afer. 61 Pliny the younger born (?). 62 Death of Persius. Seneca in danger, Burrus being dead. 63 The _Naturales Quaestiones_ of Seneca. 65 Death of Seneca (_Ann._ xv. 60). 66 Martial comes to Rome. 68 Quintilian accompanies Galba to Rome. Silius Italicus consul. 69 Silius in Rome. 75 The dialogue _de Oratoribus_, written (C. 17). 77 Pliny's _Natural History_. Gabinianus, the rhetorician, flourished. 79 Death of the elder Pliny. 80 Pliny the younger begins to plead. 88 Suetonius now a young man, Tacitus praetor. 89 Quintilian teaches at Rome. His professional career extends over 20 years. 90 Philosophers banished. Pliny praetor. _Sulpiciae Satira_ (if genuine). 95 Statii Silv. iv. 1. The _Thebaid_ was nearly finished. 96 Pliny's accusation of Publicius Certus. 97 Frontinus curator aquarum. Tacitus consul suffectus. 98 Trajan. 99 The tenth book of Martial. Silius at Naples. 100 Pliny and Tacitus accuse Marius Priscus. Pliny's panegyric. 103 Pliny at his province of Bithynia. 104 His letter about the Christians. Martial goes to Bilbilis. 109 Pliny (aet. 48) at the zenith of his fame. 118 Juvenal wrote Satire xiii. this year. 132 Salvius Julianus's Perpetual Edict. 138 Death of Hadrian. 143 Fronto consul suffectus. 164 Height of Fronto's fame. 166 Fronto proposes to describe the Parthian war. 180 Death of Marcus Aurelius.

A large number of other dates will be found in the body of the work, especially for the later period; but as they are not absolutely certain, they have not been inserted here.

LIST OF EDITIONS RECOMMENDED. [7]

FOR THE EARLY PERIOD.

WORDSWORTH. Fragments and Specimens of early Latin. 1874. LIVIUS ANDRONICUS. H. Düntzer. Berlin. 1835. NAEVIUS. Ribbeck. _Trag. Lat. Relliquiae_, p. 5. PLAUTUS. Ritschl or Fleckeisen. Unfinished. ENNIUS. Vahlen. _Ennianae Poëseos Relliquiae._ PACUVIUS. Ribbeck, as above. TERENCE. Wagner. Cambridge. 1869. Text by Umpfenbach. 1870 TURPILIUS. Fragments in Bothe (_Poet. Scen._ V. 2, p. 58-76), and Ribbeck's _Comic. Lat. Relliq._ THE EARLY HISTORIANS. Peter (_Veterum Historicorum Romanorum Relliquiae._ Lips. 1870). CATO. De Re Rustica. _Scriptores rei rusticae veteres Latini, curante_ I. M. Gesnero. Lips. 1735 Vol. 1. CATO. Fragmenta praeter libros de Re Rustica. Jordan. Lips. 1860. THE OLD ORATORS TO HORTENSIUS. H. Meyer. _Oratorum Romanorum Fragmenta. Zürich. 1842. ACCIUS. Tragedies. Fragments in Ribbeck, as above. ----- Praeter Scenica. Lucian Müller. _Lucilii Saturaran Relliquiae._ Lips. 1872. Lachmann. ATTA. Fragments. Bothe. _Scen. Lat._ v. 2, p. 97-102. Ribbeck. AFRANIUS. Bothe, p. 156-9. Ribbeck. LUCILIUS. Lucian Müller, as above. SUEVIUS. Lucian Müller, as above. ATELLANAE. Fr. in Ribbeck. _Com. Lat. Rel._ p. 192. AUCTOR AD HERENNIUM. Kayser. _Lips._ 1854.

FOR THE GOLDEN AGE.

VARRO. Saturae Menippeae. Riese. Lips. 1865. ----- Antiquities. Fragments in R. Merkel. Introduction to Ovid's _Fasti_. ----- De Vita Populi Romani. Fragments in Kettner. Halle. 1863. ----- De Lingua Latina. C. O. Müller. Lips, 1833. ----- De Re Rustica. Gesner, as above. See _Cato_. CICERO. Speeches. G. Long. London. 1862. In four volumes. ----- Verrine Orations. Long, as above. Zumpt. Berlin. 1831. CICERO. Pro Cluentio. Classen. Bonn. 1831. Ramsay. Clarendon Press. ----- In Catilinam. Halm. Lips. ----- Pro Plancio. E. Wunder. 1830. ----- Pro Murena. Zumpt. Berlin. 1859. ----- Pro Roscio. Büchner. Lips. 1835. ----- Pro Sestio. Halm. Lips. 1845. And Teubner edition. ----- Pro Milone. Orelli. Lips. 1826. School edition by Purton. Cambridge. 1873. ----- Second Philippic, with notes from Halm, by J. E. B. Mayor. ----- De Inventione. Lindemann. Lips. 1829. ----- De Oratore. Ellendt. Königsberg. 1840. ----- Brutus. Ellendt. 1844. ----- Philosophical Writings. Orelli. Vol. IV. ----- De Finibus. Madvig. Copenhagen. Second Edition. 1871. F. G. Otto. 1839. ----- Academica (with De Fin.). Orelli. Zürich. 1827. ----- Tusculanae Disputationes (with Paradoxa). Orelli. 1829. ----- De Natura Deorum. Schömann. Berlin. 1850. ----- De Senectute. Long. London. 1861. ----- De Amicitia. Nauck. Berlin. 1867. ----- De Officiis. 0. Heine. Berlin. 1857. ----- De Republica. Heinrich. Bonn. 1828. ----- De Legibus. Vahlen. 1871. ----- De Divinatione. Giese. Lips. 1829. ----- Select Letters. Watson. Oxford. ----- Entire Works. Orelli. Zür. 1845. Nobbe. Lips. 1828. LABERIUS. Ribbeck. _Com. Lot. Relliquiae_, p. 237. FURIUS BIBACULUS. Weichert. _Poet. Lat. Rell._, p. 325. SYRI. Sententiae. Woelfflin. 1869. CAESAR. Speeches. Meyer. _Orat. Rom. Fragmenta._ ----- Letters. Nipperdey. _Caesar_, p. 766-599. ----- Commentaries. Nipperdey. Lips. 1847-1856. ----- Gallic War. Long. London. 1859. NEPOS. Nipperdey. Lips. 1849. School edition by 0. Browning. LUCRETIUS. Munro. Cambridge. 1866. SALLUST. All his extant works. Gerlach. Basle. 1828-31. VARRO ATACINUS. Fragments in Riese, _Sat. Menippeae._ CHINA. Weichert. _Poetarum Lat. Vitae_, p. 187. CATULLUS. R. Ellis. Oxford. 1867 ----- Commentary. R. Ellis. Oxford. 1876. POLLIO. Fragments in Meyer. _Orat Rom. Fragmenta._ VARIUS. Ribbeck's _Tragic. Lat. Relliquiae._ VIRGIL. Ribbeck. 4 vols. With an Appendix Virgiliana. Conington. 3 vols. Oxford. A good school edition by Bryce. (Glasgow University Classics.) London. HORACE. Orelli. Third edition, 1850. 2 vols. School editions, by Macleane and Currie, both with good English Notes. Odes and Epodes, by Wickham. 1874. TIBULLUS and PROPERTIUS. Lachmann. Berlin. 1829. TIBULLUS. Dissen. PROPERTIUS. Paley. OVID. Entire Works. R. Merkel. Lips. 1851. 3 vols. ----- Fasti. Paley. ----- Heroides. Terpstra. 1829. Arthur Palmer. Longman. 1874. ----- Tristia and Ibis. Merkel. 1837. ----- Metamorphoses. Bach. 1831-6. 2 vols. GRATIUS. Haupt. Lips. 1838. Including the Halieuticon, &c. MANILIUS. Scaliger. 1579. Bentley. 1739. Jacob. Berlin. 1846. LIVY. Drakenborg. 7 vols. Teubner text. Weissenbom, with an excellent German Commentary. ----- Book I. Professor Seeley. Cambridge. JUSTIN (Trogus). Jeep. Lips. 1859. VERRIUS FLACCUS. C. O. Müller. Lips. 1839. VITRUVIUS. Schneider. Lips. 1807. 3 vols. Rose. 1867. SENECA (the elder). Keissling (Teubner series). Oratorum et Rhetorum sententiae divisiones colores. Bursian. 1857.

THE PERIOD OF THE DECLINE.

GERMANICUS (translation of Aratus). Breysig. Berlin. 1867. VELLEIUS. Kritz. Lips. 1840. Halm. VALERIUS MAXIMUS. Kempf. Berl. 1854. CELSUS. Daremberg. Lips. Teubner. PHAEDRUS. Orelli. Zür. 1831. Lucian Müller. 1876. SENECA. Tragedies. Peiper and Richter. Lips, 1867. ----- Entire Works. Fr. Haase. 3 vols. 1862-71. (Teubner.) ----- Naturales Quaestiones. Koeler. 1818. CURTIUS. Zumpt. Brunsw. 1849. COLUMELLA. In Gesner, _Scriptures Rei Rusticae_. MELA. Parthey. Berl. 1867. VALERIUS PROBUS. In Keil _Grammatici Latini_. Vol. I. 1857. PERSIUS. Jahn. Lips. 1843. Conington. Oxford. 1869. LUCAN. C. F. Weber. Lips. 1821. C. H. Weisse. Lips. 1835. PETRONIUS. Bücheler. Berl. 1871. Second edition. CALPURNIUS. Glaeser. Göttingen. 1842, ETNA. Munro. Cambridge. 1867. PLINY. Sillig. Lips. 8 vols. ----- Chrestomathia Pliniana, a useful text-book by Urlichs. Berlin. 1857. VALERIUS FLACCUS. Lemaire. Paris. 1824. Schenkl. 1871. SILIUS. Ruperti. Göttingen. 1795. STATIUS. Silvae. Markland. Lips. 1827. ----- Entire works. Queck. 1854. ----- Thebaid and Achilleid. Vol. I. 0. Müller. Lips. 1871. MARTIAL. Schneidevin. 1842. ----- Select Epigrams. Paley. London. 1875. QUINTILIAN. Bonnell. (Teubner.) 1861. ----- Halm. 2 vols. 1869. ----- Lexicon to, by Bonnell. 1834. FRONTINUS. Text by Dederich, in Teubner edition. 1855. JUVENAL. Heinrich. Bonn. 1839. Mayor. London. 1872. Vol. I. (for schools). Otto Iahn. 1868. TACITUS. Works. Orelli. 1846. Ritter. 1864. ----- Dialogue. Ritter. Bonn. 1836. ----- Agricola. Kritz. Berlin. 1865. ----- Germania. Kritz. Berlin. 1869. Latham. London. 1851. ----- Annales. Nipperdey. Berlin. 1864. PLINY the younger. Keil. Lips. 1870. ----- Letters. G. E. Gierig. 2 vols. 1800-2. ----- Letters and Panegyric. Gierig. 1806. SUETONIUS. Roth. Teubner. 1858. ----- Praeter Caesarum Libros. D. Reifferscheid. Lips. 1860. FLORUS. Jahn. Lips. 1856. FRONTO. Niebuhr. Berl. 1816. Supplement. 1832. S. A. Naber. (Teubner.) 1867. PERVIGILIUM VENERIS. Bugheler. 1859. Riese's Anthologia Latina i. p. 144. GELLIUS. Hertz. Lips. 1853. GAIUS. Lachmann. Berlin. 1842. ----- Institutes. Poste. Oxf. 1871. APULEIUS. Hildebrand. Lips. 1842. 2 vols. ITINERARIUM ANTONINI AUGUSTI ET HIEROSOLYMITANUM. G. Parthey and M. Finder. Berlin. 1848.

QUESTIONS OR SUBJECTS FOR ESSAYS SUGGESTED BY THE HISTORY OF ROMAN LITERATURE. [8]

1. Trace the influence of conquest on Roman literature.

2. Examine Niebuhr's hypothesis of an old Roman epos.

3. Compare the Roman conception of law as manifested in an argument of Cicero, with that of the Athenians, as displayed in any of the great Attic orators.

4. Trace the causes of the special devotion to poetry during the Augustan Age.

5. The love of nature in Roman poetry.

6. What were the _Collegia poetarum?_ In what connection are they mentioned?

7. What methods of appraising literary work existed at Rome? Was there anything analogous to our review system? If so, how did it differ at different epochs?

8. Sketch the development of the _Mime_, and account for its decline.

9. Criticise the merits and defects of the various forms which historical composition assumed at Rome (Hegel, _Philos. of History, Preface_).

10. "_Inveni lateritiam: reliqui marmoream_" (Augustus). The material splendour of imperial Rome as affecting literary genius. (Contrast the Speech of Pericles. Thuc. ii. 37, _sqq._)

11. _Varro dicit Musas Plautino sermone locuturas fuisse, si Latine loqui vellent_ (Quintil.). Can this encomium be justified? If so, show how.

12. "_Cetera quae vacuas tenuissent carmine mentes._" Is the true end of poetry to occupy a vacant hour? Illustrate by the chief Roman poets.

13. The vitality of Greek mythology in Latin and in modern poetry.

14. State succinctly the debt of Roman thought, in all its branches, to Greece.

15. What is the permanent contribution to human progress given by Latin literature?

16. Criticise Mommsen's remark, that the drama is, after all, the form of literature for which the Romans were best adapted.

17. Form some estimate of the historical value of the old annalists.

18. What sources of information were at Livy's command in writing his history? Did he rightly appreciate their relative value?

19. What influence did the old Roman system have in repressing poetical ideas?

20. In what sense is it true that the intellectual progress of a nation is measured by its prose writers?

21. Philosophy and poetry set before themselves the same problem. Illustrate from Roman literature.

22. Account for the notable deficiency in lyric inspiration among Roman poets.

23. Compare the influence on thought and action of the elder and younger Cato.

24. Examine the alleged incapacity of the Romans for speculative thought.

25. Compare or contrast the Italic, the Etruscan, the Greek, and the Vedic religions, as bearing on thought and literature.

26. Compare the circumstances of the diffusion of Greek and Latin beyond the limits within which they were originally spoken.

27. Analyse the various influences under which the poetical vocabulary of Latin was formed.

28. Give the rules of the Latin accent, and show how it has affected Latin Prosody. Is there any reason for thinking that it was once subjected to different rules?

29. "Latin literature lacks originality." How far is this criticism sound?

30. Examine the influence of the Alexandrine poets upon the literature of the later Republic, and of the Augustan Age.

31. What is the value of Horace as a literary critic?

32. Give a brief sketch of the various Roman writers on agriculture.

33. It has been remarked, that while every great Roman author expresses a hope of literary immortality, few, if any, of the great Greek authors mention it. How far is this difference suggestive of their respective national characters, and of radically distinct conceptions of art?

34 What instances do we find in Latin literature of the novel or romance? When and where did this style of composition first become common?

35. Trace accurately the rhythmical progress of the Latin hexameter, and indicate the principal differences between the rhythm of Lucretius, Virgil, and Horace's epistles.

36. Distinguish between the development and the corruption of a language. Illustrate from Latin literature.

37. "_Virgilius amantissimus vetustatis._" Examine in all its bearings the antiquarian enthusiasm of Virgil.

38. "_Verum orthographia quoque consuetudini servit, ideoque saepe mutata est_" (Quintil.). What _principles_ of spelling (if any), appear to be adopted by the best modern editors?

39. Show that the letter _v_, in Latin, had sometimes the sound of _w_, sometimes that of _b_; that the sounds _o u_, _e i_, _i u_, _e q_, were frequently interchanged respectively.

40. Examine the traces of a satiric tendency in Roman literature, independent of professed satire.

41. How far did the Augustan poets consciously modify the Greek metres they adopted?

42. Is it a sound criticism to call the Romans a nation of grammarians? Give a short account of the labours of any two of the great Roman grammarians, and estimate their value.

43. Cicero (_De Leg._ i. 2, 5) says: "_Abest historia a literis nostris._" Quintilian (x. i. 101) says: "_Historia non cesserit Graecis._" Criticise these statements.

44. "_O dimidiate Menander._" By whom said? Of whom said? Criticise.

45. Examine and classify the various uses of the participles in Virgil.

46. What are the chief peculiarities of the style of Tacitus?

47. "Roman history ended where it had begun, in biography." (Merivale). Account for the predominance of biography in Latin literature.

48. The Greek schools of rhetoric in the Roman period. Examine their influence on the literature of Rome, and on the intellectual progress of the Roman world.

49. In what sense can Ennius rightly be called the father of Latin literature?

50. Can the same rules of quantity be applied to the Latin comedians as to the classical poets?

51. Mention any differences in syntax between Plautus and the Augustan writers.

62. Examine the chief defects of ancient criticism.

53. The value of Cicero's letters from a historical and from a literary point of view.

54. What evidence with regard to Latin pronunciation can be gathered from the writings of Plautus and Terence?

55. Examine the nature of the chief problems involved in the settlement of the text of Lucretius.

56. Compare the Homeric characters as they appear in Virgil with their originals in the Iliad and Odyssey, and with the same as treated by the Greek tragedians.

57. How far is it true that Latin is deficient in abstract terms? What new coinages were made by Cicero?

58. Contrast Latin with Greek (illustrating by any analogies that may occur to you in modern languages) as regards facility of composition. Did Latin vary in this respect at different periods?

59. What are the main differences in Latin between the language and constructions of poetry and those of prose?

60. The use of _tmesis, asyndeton, anacoluthon, aposiopesis, hyperbaton, hyperbole, litotes_, in Latin oratory and poetry.

61. What traces, are there of systematic division according to a number of lines in the poems of Catullus or any other Latin poet with whom you are familiar? (See Ellis's _Catullus_).

62. Trace the history of the _Atellanae_, and account for their being superseded by the Mime.

63. Examine the influence of the other Italian nationalities on Roman literature.

64. Which of the great periods of Greek literature had the most direct or lasting influence upon that of Rome?

65. What has been the influence of Cicero on modern literature (1) as a philosophical and moral teacher; (2) as a stylist?

66. Give some account of the Ciceronianists.

67. What influence did the study of Virgil exercise (1) on later Latin literature; (2) on the Middle Ages; (3) on the poetry of the eighteenth century?

68. Who have been the most successful modern writers of Latin elegiac verse?

69. Distinguish accurately between _oratory_ and _rhetoric_. Discuss their relative predominance in Roman literature, and compare the latter in this respect with the literatures of England and France.

70. Give a succinct analysis of any speech of Cicero with which you are familiar, and show the principles involved in its construction.

71. Discuss the position and influence of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophies in the last age of the Republic.

72. State what plan and principle Livy lays down for himself in his _History_. Discuss and illustrate his merits as a historian, showing how far he performs what he promises.

73. Give the political theory of Cicero as stated in his _De Republica_ and _De Legibus_, and contrast it with either that of Plato, Aristotle, Machiavel, or Sir Thomas More.

74. Analyse the main argument of the _De Natura Deorum_. Has this treatise a permanent philosophical value?

75. How far did the greatest writers of the Empire understand the conditions under which they lived, and the various forces that acted around them?

76. Examine the importance of the tragedies ascribed to Seneca in the history of European literature. To whom else have they been ascribed?

77. How did the study of Greek literature at Rome affect the vocabulary and syntax of the Latin language?

78. The influence of patronage on literature. Consider chiefly with reference to Rome, but illustrate from other literatures.

79. Are there indications that Horace set before him, as a satirist, the object of superseding Lucilius?

80. Compare the relation of Persius to Horace with that of Lucan to Virgil.

81. Account for the imperfect success of Varro as an etymologist, and illustrate by examples.

82. What is known of Nigidius Figulus, the Sextii, Valerius Soranus, and Apuleius as teachers of philosophic doctrine?

83. Sketch the literary career of the poet Accius.

84 What were the main characteristics of the old Roman oratory? What classical authorities exist for its history?

85. Prove the assertion that jurisprudence was the only form of intellectual activity that Rome from first to last worked out in a thoroughly national manner.

86. Compare the portrait of Tiberius as given by Tacitus, with any of the other great creations of the historic imagination. How far is it to be considered truthful?

87. At what time did abridgments begin to be used at Rome? Account for their popularity throughout the Middle Ages, and mention some of the most important that have come down to us.

88. What remains of the writers on applied science do we possess?

89. Is it probable that the great developments of mathematical and physical science at Alexandria had any general effect upon the popular culture of the Roman world?

90. What are our chief authorities for the old Roman religion?

91. Account for the influence of Fronto, and give a list of his writings.

92. Which are the most important of the public, and which ef the private, orations of Cicero? Give a short account of one of each class, with date, place, and circumstances of delivery. How were such speeches preserved? Had the Romans any system of reporting?

93. A life of Silius Italicus with a short account of his poem.

94. Who, in your opinion, are the nearest modern representatives of Horace, Lucilius, and Juvenal?

95. In what particulars do the alcaic and sapphic metres of Horace differ from their Greek models? What are the different forms of the asclepiad metre in Horace? Have any of the Horatian metres been used by other writers?

96. Enumerate the chief imitations of Ennius in Virgil, noting the alterations where such occur.

97. Point out the main features of the Roman worship. (See index to Merivale's _Rome_, s. v. _Religion_.)

98. Write a life of Maecenas, showing his position as chief minister of the Empire, and as the centre of literary society of Rome during the Augustan Age.

99. Donaldson, in his _Varronianus_, argues that the French rather than the Italian represents the more perfect form of the original Latin. Test this view by a comparison of words in both languages with the Latin forms.

100. Give a summary of the argument in any one of the following works:-- Cicero's _De Finibus, Tusculan disputations, De Officis_, or the first and second books of Lucretius.

101. State the position and influence on thought and letters of the two Scipios, Laelius, and Cato the censor.

102. Give Caesar's account of the religion of the Gauls, and compare it with the _locus classicus_ on the subject in Lucan (I. 447). What were the national deities of the Britons, and to which of the Roman deities were they severally made to correspond?

103. Examine the chief differences between the Ciceronian and Post- Augustan syntax.

104. Trace the influence of the study of comparative philology on Latin scholarship.

105. "Italy remained without national poetry or art" (Mommsen). In what sense can this assertion be justified?

106. What passages can you collect from Virgil, Horace, Tacitus, and Juvenal, showing their beliefs on the great questions of philosophy and religion?

107. Examine the bearings of a highly-developed inflectional system like those of the Greek and Latin languages, upon the theory of prose composition.

108. To what periods of the life of Horace would you refer the composition of the Book of Epodes and the Books of Satires and Epistles? Confirm your view by quotations.

109. What is known of Suevius, Pompeius Trogus, Salvius Julianus, Gaius, and Celsus?

110. Who were the chief writers of encyclopaedias at Rome?

111. How do you account for the short duration of the legitimate drama at Rome?

112. Who were the greatest Latin scholars of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries? In what department of scholarship did they mostly labour, and why?

113. Enumerate the chief losses which Latin literature has sustained.

114. Who were the original inhabitants of Italy? Give the main characteristics of the Italic family of languages. To which was it most nearly akin?

115. Illustrate from Juvenal the relations between patron and client.

116. Contrast briefly the life and occupations of an Athenian citizen in the time of Pericles and Plato, with those of a Roman in the age of Cicero and Augustus.

N.B.--Many other questions will be suggested by referring to the Index.

FOOTNOTES

INTRODUCTION

[1] Quint. I. 5, 72. The whole chapter is most interesting.

[2] How different has been the lot of Greek! An educated Greek at the present day would find little difficulty in understanding Xenophon or Menander. The language, though shaken by rude convulsions, has changed according to its own laws, and shown that natural vitality that belongs to a genuinely popular speech.

[3] See Conington on the Academical Study of Latin. Post. Works, i. 206.

[4] See esp. R. II. Bk. 1, ch. ix. and xv.