Part 6

Whether we write laborious verse or laborious prose-- so the attack begins-- it is all one; display and applause are the aim and object of both. The style is fustian; the delivery wanton; the theme prurient. The bard is little better than a bawd (13-23). And yet so deeply rooted is this love of praise that learning is loss, unless it be minted into golden opinions, and knowledge is naught until it be known of men. To be pointed out as a lion, to be used as a school classic-- what glory! (24-30). Oh, yes! A glory shared by the dainty ditties, the mewling elegies of lisping, snuffling dandies, for this is what calls forth the approval of the after-dinner circle. Such is the praise that is to bless the poet even after death! (30-40). It is true that fame is not to be despised. No poet but feels his heart vibrate to praise. But the popular acclaim is not the ultimate standard. Mad epics, elegies thrown off in a surfeit, effusions of aristocratic easy-chairs are alike lauded. A man feeds the hungry and clothes the naked, and then asks for a candid opinion. Mockery of criticism! (40-62). The taste of the people relishes nothing but smooth verses-- verses without flaw or break, faultless machine-verses-- which answer any turn, and serve alike for satire, for eclogues, for heroic strains (63-75). Others, again, call themselves passionate pilgrims to the well of Latin undefiled, and linger over the obsolete magniloquence of Pacuvius and Accius. A fine _olla podrida_-- this jumble of modern affectation and ancient trumpery (76-82). Bad as this is in literature, how much worse it is to find that the jargon of the _salon_ has become the language of the courts, and that the manly Roman speech is dead. Even in a matter of life and death, the accused thinks more of his rhetorical than of his judicial sentence, and listens for a 'Pretty good,' as if that were the verdict (83-91). It will not do to say that great improvements have been made in the art of verse. Smooth are the verses and resonant, but at the cost of sense, of manly vigor. Once catch the trick, and any body can reel off such lines (92-106). Ears are ticklish, our satirist admits. Truth is an unwelcome rasp, and the cold shoulder of great men no toothsome meal. Police regulations are stringent. 'Commit no nuisance' is posted every where. Ah, well! It was otherwise in the time of Lucilius. That was a free world in which he craunched Lupus and Mucius. It was otherwise in the time of Horace. That was a gay world, in which he tickled while he taught. And is the poet not to mutter even? King Midas's barber told his master's secret to a ditch. Where can a ditch be found? Here in this book (107-121). Few readers can our author hope or desire-- only such as have studied closely the great masters of the Attic sock, not such as ignorantly make a mock of Greek attire and Greek science, pride themselves on petty local honors, and rise to no higher conception of wit or fun than a dog-fight or a jibe at personal infirmity (122-134).

It has been well observed that this is the only Satire of Persius in the strict sense of the term; the other five have rather the character of essays on moral themes.

One of the best commentaries on this poem is the famous 114th Epistle of Seneca.

The student of English literature will remember that Gifford's Baviad is an imitation of this piece.

1-7. At the very outset we encounter a difficulty in the distribution of the first lines between P. (Persius) and M. (Monitor, as the second interlocutor is usually called). The arrangement followed in the text may be explained thus:

P. (_is discovered absorbed in contemplation. He recites a line from his projected poem_).-- 'Vanity of vanities!'

M.-- Who will read this stuff of yours?

P. (_wakes up_).-- Do you mean that for me? Why, no one, of course.

M.-- No one?

P.-- Next to no one.

M.-- A lame and impotent conclusion!

P.-- Why so? Am I to fear that Polydamas and the Trojan dames shall make up their minds to give Labeo the preference over me? Stuff! Don't assent, when muddled Rome rejects a thing as light weight, and do not trouble yourself to get the faulty tongue of that pair of scales to work right, and look not outside of yourself for what you can find only within yourself.

1. #O curas hominum! O quantum est in rebus inane!# _Homines_ and _res_ are both used for 'the world,' sometimes singly, sometimes together. _Res_ is often to be omitted in translation, or another turn given. _O quantum est in rebus inane_, 'Vanity of vanities'-- a suitable Stoic text. There seems to be no allusion to Lucretius's common phrase, _in rebus inane_.

2. #Quis leget haec?# a quotation from Lucilius, according to the scholiast. Jahn follows Pinzger in supposing that the quotation begins with _O curas hominum!_ See, however, L. Müller, _Lucilius_, p. 194.

3. #vel duo vel nemo#: is more guarded, and hence (by Litotes) stronger than _nemo_. Comp. Gr. +ê tis ê oudeis+.

4. #ne mihi praetulerint#: an elliptical sentence, such as we often find in final relations (A., 70, 3, _f_), in English as well as in Latin (G., 688, R.). The sequence is not common in the classic period, but see G., 512, R. Comp. Plaut., Aul., 2, 3, 11; Liv., 44, 22, and Weissenborn in loc. The Greek would be: +mê protimêsôsi+. --#Polydamas#: Some write _Pulydamas_, corresponding with the Homeric form, +Pouludamas+; but _P[-o]lydamas_ (+Pôludamas+) is the Sicilian Doric, like _p[-o]lypus_ (+pôlupos+). The allusion is to a familiar passage in Hom., Il., 22, 100. 104. 5: +Pouludamas moi prôtos elencheiên anathêsei-- nun d' epei ôlesa laon atasthaliêsin emêsin | aideomai Trôas kai Trôadas helkesipeplous+. These are the words of Hector, as he steels his great heart to meet Achilles. Polydamas is the counsellor who had urged him (18, 254) to withdraw the Trojans into Troy, and Hector is ashamed to turn back and encounter the rebuke of Polydamas and the reproaches of his people. Persius uses Polydamas as the type of the Roman critic, and by a familiar satiric stroke leaves out the Trojan men, as if they were no men in Rome. Others understand 'Nero and his effeminate court.' The Homeric passage had been well worn by Aristotle and Cicero (Att., 2, 5, 1; 7, 1, 4; 8, 16, 2) before it came to Persius. There is perhaps a side-thrust at the pride of the old Roman families in their Trojan descent. Comp. Juv., 1, 100: _iubet a praecone vocari | ipsos #Troiugenas#_; also 8, 181. See Friedländer, _Sittengesch_., 1, 230. --#Labeonem#: the Attius (Labeo) of v. 50, an unfortunate translator of Homer, who stuck close to the letter. The scholiast has preserved a line. +Ômon bebrôthois Priamon Priamoio te paidas+ (Il., 4, 35) is rendered thus: _crudum manduces Priamum Priamique pisinnos_. 'Raw you'd munch both Priam himself and Priam's papooses.'

5. #nugae#: The accusative is more common. Comp. G., 340, R. 1. --#non accedas-- nec quaesiveris#: _Non_ and _nec_, where Quintilian's rigid rule (1, 5, 50) requires _ne_ and _neve_. G., 266, R. 1; A., 41, 2, _e_. Comp. 3, 73 and 5, 45. --#turbida#: 'muddle-headed' (Conington). But comp. _Alexandrea turbida_, Auson., Clar. Urb., 3, 4.

6, 7. #elevet#: 'reject as light.' The figure is taken from weighing, doubtless a common trope in the schools. --#examen#: (_filum, ligula_) is the 'index, tongue, or needle' which is said to be _inprobum_, 'faulty,' 'wilful,' 'untoward,' because it does not move freely or accurately on its pivot. --#trutina#: (Gr. +trutanê+, a word of doubtful etymology and loose application, means here 'a balance,' 'a pair of scales,' not, as the scholiast says, the _foramen_, 'fork' or 'cheeks,' in which the _examen_ plays. --#castiges# = _percutias_ (Schol.) of the tap given to a hitching balance. Gesner, s.v., regards _castigare_ here as equivalent to _conpescere_ (5, 100), a view which has a good deal in its favor. The notion is not 'do not correct the popular standard,' but 'do not try to get an exact result by the popular standard (for your guidance).' Hermann (_Lect. Pers._, II., 9) follows those who understand the _examen_ and _trutina_ of different instruments: _Noli examen tuum in #populi# trutina castigare._[3] So Pretor, who translates: 'Do not try to correct the erring tongue of your delicate balance by applying to it a pair of ordinary scales.' --#nec te quaesiveris extra#: (_te_) 'Nor look for yourself (what you can find only in yourself) outside of yourself.' 'Be your own norm.' Others arrange: _nec quaesiveris extra te_, 'Nor ask any opinion but your own.'

[Footnote 3: No satisfactory treatment of this subject is accessible to me. The Greek and Latin dictionaries are wildly at variance with one another and with the authorities. _Examen_ seems to have been originally the strap by which the beam was suspended-- not from AG, but from AP. See Isidor., Orig., 16, 23, and comp. _amentum_ (_ammentum_). Add Lucil., 16, 14 (L. Müller). Eustathius's +trutanê epi zogou hê teiromenê tô barei tôn ogkôn+ points to the pivot (knife-edge) as the first meaning of _trutina_.]

8-12. The distribution followed is that of Jahn (1843), which gives _nolo_ (v. 11) to the interlocutor. The jerky, self-interrupting discourse is supposed to be characteristic of the _petulante splene cachinno_. 'What is the use of consulting Rome? Every body there is an-- If I might say what! If I might? Surely I may, when I consider how old we are become, how grum we are, and all the step-fatherly manner of our lives, since the days of "commoneys" and "alley tors." Indulge me. _It can not be._ What am I to do? Nothing? But I am a man of laughter with a saucy spleen.'

8. #nam Romae quis non?# The suppressed predicate is to be supplied from the general scope of the passage. The sentence is not completed in v. 131 (_auriculas asini habet_), for the simple reason that Persius did not write _quis non_ in that passage, but _Mida rex_.

9. #cum--aspexi#: _Cum_ is equivalent to _postquam_ here. G., 567; A., 62, 3, _e_. --#canitiem#: 'premature old age,' 'loss of youthful freshness.' All through this satire the poet lashes old age, as commentators have observed. So here, and 22. 26. 56. 79. The 'hoary head' is not a 'crown of glory,' but a sign of debauchery; the 'fair, round belly,' which is not uncomely in the elderly justice, is nothing but a swagging paunch; the bald pate is not a mirror of honor, but a mirror of dishonor; in short, 'no fool like an old fool.' Especially severe is Persius on the 'used-up' man; and the affected moralizing of young men, who had outlived their youth before they had had time to forget the games of boyhood, drove him to satire. On the Neronian hypothesis, Persius is endeavoring to masquerade as an old man. --#nostrum istud vivere triste#: 'sour way of life.' This is a so-called _figura Graeca_, which out-Greeks the Greeks. Good authors are very cautious in adding an attribute to the infinitive, and do not go beyond _ipsum, hoc ipsum_. _Scire tuum_, v. 27; _ridere meum_, v. 122; _velle suum_, 5, 53; _sapere nostrum_, 6, 38, can not be rendered literally into the language from which they are supposed to be imitated. Nursery infinitives (3, 17) belong to a different category.

10. #nucibus#: The modern equivalent is 'marbles.' The very games survive. (See 3, 50.) It is hardly necessary to prove that putting away such childish things means becoming a man. _Da nuces pueris, iners | concubine: satis diu | lusisti nucibus_, Catull., 61, 127-9.

11. #patruos#: On the accusative, see G., 329, R. 1; A., 52, 1, _c._ The _patruorum rigor_ was proverbial. Owing to the legal position of the paternal uncle, who was often the guardian, it is the _patruus_, not the _avunculus_, who is the type of severity. So the cruel uncle of the ballad of the 'children in the wood' is the father's brother.

12. #quid faciam?# G., 258; A., 57, 6. --#sed#: (I know you want me to do nothing), 'but' (I can't keep quiet) 'I am a laugher born.' --#petulante#: literally, 'given to butting,' hence 'saucy' --#splene#: The seat of laughter. --#cachinno#: a substantive, perhaps built by Persius on the analogy of _bibo_, _epulo_, _erro_, etc. Comp. _glutto_, 5, 112; _palpo_, 5, 176. Hermann, following Heindorf, makes _cachinno_ a verb, and reads: _tunc, tunc-- ignoscite, nolo; quid faciam sed sum petulante splene-- cachinno_, 'Then-- then-- excuse me-- I would rather not-- what am I to do?-- I can't help it-- my spleen is too much for me-- I must have my laugh.' Jahn (1868) accepts _tunc, tunc-- ignoscite, nolo_, but goes no further.

13-23. The battery opens. Verse-wright and writer of prose alike care for nothing except applause. Follows a vivid picture of a popular recitation.

13. #Scribimus inclusi#: Comp. _scribimus indocti_, etc. Hor., Ep., 2, 1, 117. --#inclusi#: 'in closet pent' (Gifford's Baviad), to show the artificial and labored character of the composition in contrast with the beggarly result. Markland's ingenious conjecture, _inclusus numeris_, is not necessary. Heinr. admires Markl., but retains _numeros_ as a Greek accusative! --#numeros#: 'poetry;' #pede liber# = _pede libero_, 'foot-loose,' 'prose,' _soluta oratio_.

14. #grande#: 'vast,' 'grandiose.' _Grandis_ is always used with intention, which our word 'grand' sometimes fails to give. See 1, 68; 2, 42; 3, 45. 55; 5, 7. 186; 6, 22. --#quod pulmo#: 'something vast enough to make a lung generous of breath pant in the utterance of it.' Jahn (1868) reads _quo_ for _quod; quo_ is not so vigorous. --#animae praelargus#: a stretch of the adjectives of fulness (G., 373, R. 6; A., 50, 3, _b_); _praelargus = capacissimus._

15. #scilicet#: Ironical sympathy, 'O yes!' --#haec#: The position is emphatic. --#populo#: 'to the public,' 'in public.' The political force of _populus_ has ceased. --#pexus#: 'with hair and beard well dress'd.' 'Combed' hardly conveys the notion: say 'shampooed.' --#togaque recenti#: 'fresh' (from the fuller).

16. #natalicia sardonyche#: Jewelry reserved for great occasions. The brilliancy of the sardonyx is a common theme. _Rufe vides ilium subsellia prima tenentem | cuius et hinc lucet sardonychata manus_, Mart., 2, 29, 1-2 --#tandem#: shows impatience. --#albus# = _albatus_ (comp. 2, 40; Hor., Sat., 2, 2, 61) on account of the _toga recens_. So _niveos ad frena Quirites_, Juv., 10, 45. Heinr. argues at length in favor of 'pale.'

17. #sede celsa# = _ex cathedra_. --#leges#: So Jahn (1868), despite the MSS. _Legens_ may be explained at a pinch as _lecturus_, a comma being put after _ocello_; Hermann combines with _pulmo_, and comp. Juv., 10, 238 sq., where _os_ stands for the owner of the same. Add _cana gula_, Juv., 14, 10. But _pexus_ and _albus_ make such a synecdoche incredible. --#liquido#: _quia liquidam vocem efficit._ Comp. Hor., Od., 1, 24, 3: _cui liquidam pater | vocem cum cithara dedit_. The attribute is put for the effect, as in _pallidam Pirenen_, Prol., 4. --#plasmate#: according to Quint., 1, 8, 2, a technical name for the professional training of the voice, a kind of rhetorical _solfeggio_. Others understand the _plasma_ of a gargle to clear the throat.

18. #mobile collueris#: _Mobile_ is predicative. Translate: 'after gargling your throat to suppleness by filtering modulation.' --#patranti ocello#: 'an eye that would be doing,' 'a leering, lustful eye.' Quint. (8, 3, 44) says of _patrare: mala consuetudine in obscenum intellectum sermo detortus_. Comp. 'do' in Shaksp., Troil. and Cressida, 4, 2: Go hang yourself, you naughty, mocking uncle! You bring me to _do_, and then you flout me too. --#fractus# = _effeminatus_, 'debauched,' 'languishing,' _+kladaros+._ Conington translates: 'with a languishing roll of your wanton eye.'

19. #neque more probo nec voce serena#: Litotes. See Prol., 1.

20. #ingentis Titos#: Comp. _celsi Rhamnes_, Hor., A. P., 342. Here, however, there is a reference to size of body (like _ingens Pulfennius_, 5, 190; _torosa iuventus_, 3, 86; _caloni alto_, 5, 95), for which Persius seems to have had a Stoic contempt. _Titi_, perhaps another form of _Tities_, the old Sabine nobility (Mommsen, _Rom. Gesch._, B. 1, K. 4), of whom much aristocratic virtue might have been expected (_sanctos licet horrida mores | tradiderit domus ac veteres imitata #Sabinos#_, Juv., 10, 298-9). Instead of that we have great, hulking debauchees. --#trepidare#: 'quiver.' The word is used indifferently of pleasant and unpleasant agitation. The quavering measure thrills them so that they can not sit still. On the infinitive, see 3, 64.

21. #scalpuntur intima#: 'their marrow is tickled.' _Scalpere_ is opposed to _radere_, 1, 107. Comp. 3, 114; 5, 15.

22. #tun#: _-ne_ is often found in rhetorical questions. --#vetule#: 'you old reprobate,' 'you old sinner.' --#escas#: 'tidbits;' '_escas colligere_,' 'cater.'

23. #quibus et dicas#: _Et_ belongs to _cute perditus_, which is variously explained 'dropsical,' 'unblushing,' 'thoroughly diseased.' The context requires a tough subject, and 'hide-bound' or 'case-hardened' might answer as a rendering. --#ohe#: a reminiscence of Hor., Sat. 2, 5, 96: _importunus amat laudari; donec '#Ohe iam#' | ad caelum manibus sublatis dixerit, urge, | crescentem tumidis infla sermonibus utrem_, which last line helps us to understand _cute perditus_. Persius, as is his wont, tries to improve on Horace, and makes his man inelastic.

24-43. M. Study is useless except to show what a man has in him. --P. A low ideal for a student. --M. Fame is a fine thing. --P. It would be a fine thing if it were not shared by every dinner-table poet. --M. You are too captious. It is a great thing to have written poems that are proof against trunk-maker and pastry-cook.

24. #Quo didicisse?# The exclamatory infinitive with involved subject. G., 534 (340); A., 57, 8, _g_.

25. #iecore#: the seat of the passions. Here 'heart' or 'breast' would seem to be more appropriate. --#caprificus#: the wild fig-tree sprouts in the clefts of rocks and cracks of buildings, which it rends in its growth. _Ad quae | discutienda valent mala robora fici_, Juv., 10, 145.

26. #En pallor seniumque#: 'So that's the meaning of your studious pallor (v. 124; 3, 85; 5, 62) and your (early) old age.' With _senium_ comp. Hor., Ep., 1, 18, 47: _inhumanae #senium# depone Camenae_. Persius mocks at the weariness to the flesh which the student has undergone for so paltry a result. This is the arrangement of Jahn (1843) and Hermann. Jahn (1868) follows Heinr. in giving the line to the remonstrant. _En_, originally an interrogative, is, after the time of Sallust, confounded with _em_, and combined with the nom. in the sense of _em_, which properly takes the accus. alone. So Ribbeck, _Beiträge zur Lehre von den latein. Partikeln_, S. 35. --#o mores#: Cicero's famous ejaculation. --#usque adeone#: _Usque adeone mori miserum est_, Verg., Aen., 12, 646; _usque adeo nihil est_, Juv., 3, 84.

27. #scire tuum nihil est#, etc.: 'And is thy knowledge nothing if not known' (Gifford). These jingles were much admired in antiquity. The passage from Lucilius, which Persius is said to have imitated, reads, according to L. Müller (fr. inc., 40, 73): _ne dampnum faciam, scire hoc sibi nesciat is me_. A better example in Lucr., 4, 470.

28. #At#: objects. See G., 490; A., 43, 3, _b_. --#digito monstrari#: +daktulô deiknusthai (daktulodeikteisthai)+. _Quod #monstror digito# praetereuntium_, Hor., Od., 4, 3, 22; _saepe aliquis #digito# vatem designat euntem_, Ov., Am., 3, 1. 19. --#hic est#: +houtos ekeinos+, in the well-known story of Demosthenes. Cic., Tusc. Dis., 5, 36. --#dicier#: On the form, see G., 191, 2; A., 30, 6, _e_, 4. So _fallier_, 3, 50.

29. #cirratorum#: 'curl-pates.' Jahn cites Mart., 9, 29, 7: _Matutini #cirrata# caterva magistri_. School-boys wore their hair long, but Persius does not waste his epithets, and 'youths of quality' are doubtless meant. Comp. the _lautorum pueros_ of Juv., 7, 177. --#dictata#: 'Persius takes not only higher schools, but higher lessons, _dictata_ being passages from the poets read out by the master (for want of books) and repeated by the boys' (Conington). Translate 'a lesson-book,' a 'school classic.'

30. #Ecce#: introduces a satiric sketch of 'classic poets at work.' --#inter pocula#: 'over their cups.' Poems were read at table by an +anagnôstês+, as lives of the saints are still read in religious houses.

31. #Romulidae#: Comp. _Titos_, v. 20; _trossulus_, v. 82; _Romule_, v. 87. --#dia#: +theia+, an affected word. 'Let us hear,' say the company, 'what his charming verses are about' (Pretor). Conington renders: 'What news from the divine world of poesy?'

32. #hyacinthia laena#: The dandies of the day wore upper garments of military cut and gay colors. A similar military dandyism on the part of non-military men is observable in the Macedonian period. Comp. +chlamudêphoroi andres+, Theocr., 15, 6, with the commentators.

33. #rancidulum quiddam#: 'affected stuff,' 'namby-pamby trash.' --#balba de nare# = _de nare balbutiens_, 'with a nasal lisp,' 'with a snuffle and a lisp' (Conington). _Balbus_ is especially used of the introduction of an aspirate, and 'lisp,' which involves a spirant, is only approximate. Comp. +thauma mega+, _inquid #balba#_, Lucil., 6, 20, with L. Müller's note. --#locutus#: Perf. Part. where we should expect a Present. G., 278, R.

34. #Phyllidas Hypsipylas#: Phyllis, fearing that she had been deserted by her lover, Demophon, hanged herself, and was changed into an almond-tree (Ov., Her., 2). Hypsipyle of Lemnos, after bearing two children to Jason, was forsaken by him (Ov., Her., 6). These doleful themes (_plorabilia_) were popular in Persius's time. The plural is contemptuous in Latin as in English.

35. #eliquat#: 'filters.' Every rough particle is strained out so as to make the voice 'liquid.' The passage from Apul., Flor., p. 351, Elm., cited by Jahn, _canticum videtur ore tereti semihiantibus in conatu labellis #eliquare#_, indicates a cooing position of the lips, in which the mouth simulates a colander. --#supplantat#: +huposkelizei+ (Lucil., 29, 50, L. M.), 'trips up.' To judge by Hor., Sat., 2, 3, 274, _balba #feris# annoso verba palato_, of which the language of Persius seems to be an exaggeration, the sounds impinge upon the roof of the mouth instead of coming out boldly-- a kind of lolling utterance. --#tenero#: adds another shade: the tripping is light, for the roof is sensitive; 'minces his words as though his mouth were sore' (Pretor).

36. #adsensere viri#: Observe the Epic vein. _Adsensere omnes_, Verg., Aen., 2, 130; _adsensere dii_, Ov., Met., 9, 259 (Jahn). _Viri_, 'heroes.' --#non-? -- non-?# On the form of the question, see G., 455; A., 71, 1, R.

37. #levior cippus#: Sufficiently familiar is the old wish, SIT · TIBI · TERRA · LEVIS, which, like the modern R · I · P ·, was promoted to the dignity of initials (S · T · T · L ·). --#ossa#: _Patrono meo #ossa# bene quiescant_, Petron., 39.

38. #manibus# = _cineribus_, 'remains' (Conington). On this 'materialism,' see Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, 2, 24 foll.

40. #nascentur violae#: 'Lay her i' the earth | and from her fair and unpolluted flesh | may _violets spring_.' Shaksp., Hamlet, 5, 1. --#'Rides' ait#: As in Hor., Ep., 1, 19, 43. _Ait_ is used like _inquit_ (G., 199, R. 3), without any definite reference. --#nimis uncis | naribus indulges#: 'you are too much given to hooking, curling your nose.' _Naribus uti_, Hor., Ep., 1, 19, 45; _naso adunco_, Hor., Sat., 1, 6, 5.