An Essay on True and Apparent Beauty in which from Settled Principles is Rendered the Grounds for Choosing and Rejecting Epigrams Part 5

[3] 177-8, 173

[4] All three pa.s.sages are from epigrams by Gaspar Conrad in Ja.n.u.s Gruter, _Delitiae poetarum germanorum_, 6 v., Frankfort, 1612: II, 1065-6, lines 1-6 of a twelve line epigram, "In symbolum Iacobi Monavi"; II, 1077, the concluding lines of an eight line epigram, "Ad Valentinum Maternum"; and II, 1079, the concluding couplet of a six line epigram, "Ad Georgum Menhadum Philophilum." The second pa.s.sage is hardly construable.

[5] _Ars. poet._ 141-2, the paraphrase of Homer, and 143-4. The other quotations in this pa.s.sage are from the opening of the _Aeneid_, _Thebaid_, _Rape of Proserpine_, and the _Pharsalia_.

[6] _Inst. orat._ 8.6.14

[7] "Manes Dousici," IV "Ad solem" and V "Ad sidera," _Poemata_, Leyden, 1613, p. 166. Nicole reads _tandem_ for _rursus_ in the last line of the second poem. Douza is the younger Ja.n.u.s Douza (1571-1596).

Nicole's criticism of these poems is just but superficial. The difficulty with such poems lies in the method, which consists in the establishment by amplification of one pole, followed by the briefest statement of the contrary pole. But the latter is of personal concern and is the essential subject of the poem. Thus the subject is deliberately avoided for the greater part of the poem, and hence there is in the amplification no principle of order to control the detail and its acc.u.mulation. This accounts for the features Nicole censures; however, he himself makes a similar point below in condemning negative descriptions.

[8] I have been unable to find this among Grotius' poems.

[9] Joannes Vulteius (c.1510-1542), "De ign.o.bili Aruerno in sepulchro n.o.bili posito," _Hendecasyllaborum libri iv_, Paris, 1538, Ni., p. 97.

[10] "Ad Rudolphum Imp. florum picturae dedicatio," _Poemata_, Leyden, 1637, p. 326.

[11] Epig. 1.50, "De Jucundo architecto," _Poemata_, Pavia, 1719, p.

189.

[12] I have been unable to identify this epigram.

[13] A translation of _Anth. Pal._ 11.104 and printed as Ausonius in the Renaissance, but probably by Girogio Merula (c.1424-1494): see James Hutton, _The Greek Anthology In Italy to the year 1800_, "Cornell Studies in English," XXIII (1935), pp. 23-4, 102-5, and Ausonius, _Opuscula_, ed. Rudolphus Peiper, Leipzig, 1886, p. 428. The younger Scaliger strongly condemns this epigram on the same grounds: Joseph Scaliger, _Ausoniarum lectionum libri ii_, 2.20, Heidelberg, 1688, p. 204.

[14] 3.66

[15] Epig. libri tres, ad D. Mariam Neville, 2.211. _Epigrammata_, Amsterdam, 1647, p. 47. Translated by Thomas Harvey, _John Owen's Latin Epigrams_, London, 1677, p. 36: "Sith th' Harps discording Strings concording be, / Is't not a shame for men to disagree?" and by Thomas Pecke, _Parna.s.si puerperium_, London, 1659: "Can there be many strings; and yet no Jars? / And are not men asham'd of dismal wars?"

[16] Nicole's text follows what are now regarded as inferior mss: see Germanious Caesar, _Aratea_, ed. Alfred Breysig, 2nd. ed., Leipzig, 1899, p. 58. The poem corresponds to _Anth. Pal._ 7.542. Nicole's comment recalls Dr. Johnson on Gray's cat.

[17] The dedicatory poem, addressed to Louis XIII, to Caspar Barlaeus'

_Poematum editio nova_, Leyden, 1631, sig.*8.

[18] 22.10

[19] Epig. 1.25, _Opera Omnia_, 2 v., Leyden, 1725, II, 365. Nicole's text presents several variants and cuts the next to the last couplet, which I translate: "Already at the tomb, He beats the gates / Of Dis, and Libertina waits his torches."

[20] Epig. 3.5, _op. cit._, p. 233.

[21] Catullus 36 and Martial 1.109. 10-11

[22] _Pis._ 13

[23] _Aen._ 1.630

[24] _Anthologia Latina_, ed. Alexander Riese, 412.17, Leipzig, 1894, I, 1, p.319. The epigram, from which this phrase is quoted, was ascribed to Seneca by Pithoeus.

[25] Epig.... ad ... Neville, 2.126, _op. cit._, p. 38. Harvey, p. 36, translates: "Lo, not an hair thine heads bald Crown doth crown: / Thy Faithless Front hath not one hair thine own: / Before, Behind thine hair's blown off with Blast, / What's left thee to be lost? thine Head at last."

[26] In the preface, _Delectus_, Paris, 1659, ch. 2. The problem was whether to print a large collection of epigrams, rejecting merely the obscene ones, or to choose only the best. A middle way was taken for these reasons: 1) there are so few first-cla.s.s epigrams that a reader who had his own opinions might think the selection too choosy; 2) the best shines out only in comparison with what is not so good, and examples of vice are as useful as examples of virtue, since judgement in large measure consists in knowing what to avoid; 3) finally and princ.i.p.ally, the curiosity of young men would not be sufficiently satisfied by the selection if they knew that a good many witty and polished epigrams were to be found elsewhere. Since it was especially necessary to keep youth from the unspeakable filth of Catullus and Martial, who are at the same time the best writers, everything of theirs is included except the cheapest odds and ends and filthiest obscenities. For the writers after Martial stricter standards were applied, for the book would have grown beyond bounds if everything tolerable had been admitted.

[27] Martial 5.37, 1, 4-6, 9, 12-14. The lines that Nicole cuts contain only more of the same.

[28] Martial 1.76

[29] Epig. libri tres ad Henric.u.m ... ded. 1.67, _op. cit._, p. 131.

[30] Unidentified. The text reads: "In nive nocte vagans nuceo cado stipite nectus, / Sic mihi nix, nox, nux, nex fuit ante diem."

[31] 1.8. 5-6.

[32] The conclusion of an epigram of ten lines, ascribed to Seneca in _Delectus_, pp. 326-7. Lines 1-8 correspond to _Anth. Lat._, _op.

cit._, 407. 5-12. The younger Scaliger had begun a new epigram with line 5, as also with lines 9 and 11 (ed., Vergil, _Appendix, c.u.m supplemento_ ..., Lyons, 1572, pp. 196-7.) The concluding sententia, however, which Nicole quotes here and praises later in the notes to the anthology, is from the conclusion of the next epigram, _Anth.

Lat._, 408. 7-8, which is a response to the preceding one. But the first two-thirds of the couplet has been rewritten with the aid of something like a _Gradus ad Parna.s.sum_. The ms reads, "nunc et reges tantum fuge! vivere doctus / uni vive tibi nam moriare tibi." Nicole reads, "Mitte superba pati fastidia, spemque caducam / Despice: vive tibi, nam moriere tibi." _superba pati fastidia_ corresponds to Vergil, _Ecl._ 2.15; _spem ... caducam_ to Ovid, _Epist._ 15 (sive 16, "Paris Helenae"). 169 (sive 171).

The epigram as it stands in the anthology, then, is a result of Scaliger's disintegration of _Anth. Lat._ 407, which suggested beginning with line 5 and adding 408. 7-8 from the responsory poem.

But this couplet is subjected to improvement to adjust it to the sense, to sustain the level of feeling, and to enhance the sententious point. Thus, with the aid of phrases from Vergil and Ovid, using _mitte_ and _despice_ as fillers and helpers, the epigram is concluded "with a n.o.ble, exalted and true thought," as the editor says in the notes.

[33] _Inst. orat._ 11.1.16.

[34] J. C. Scaliger, _Poeticas libri vii_, 3.125, 5th. ed., 1607, p.

389.

[35] _loc. cit._, p. 390: "An epigram, therefore, is a short poem directly pointing out some thing, person, or deed, or deducing something from premises. This definition includes also the principle of division--so let no one condemn it as prolix." Nicole, however, uses only the first half of the definition, since he rejects the principle of division.

[36] _loc. cit._: "Brevity is a property; point the soul and, so to speak, the form." For a full account of the Renaissance theory of the epigram and the contemporary controversies, see Hutton, _op. cit._, pp. 55-73, and _The Greek Anthology in France and in the Latin writers of the Netherlands to the year 1800_, "Cornell studies in cla.s.sical philology," XXVIII (1946), _pa.s.sim_.

[37] Anon., "In statuam equestrem Ludouici XIII positam Parisiis in circo regali," _Delectus_, pp. 409-10.

[38] Nicolas Borbon, the younger, _Poematia exposita_, Paris, 1630, pp. 144-5, the concluding lines (lines 23-30) of an epigram, "In versus v.c. Iacobi Pinonis."

[39] Catullus 1.7

[40] Ia.n.u.s Vitalis Panomita.n.u.s (c.1485-1560), "Antiquae Romae ruinae ill.u.s.tres," _Delectus_, p. 366; see also _Delitiae delitiarum_, ed.

Ab. Wright, Oxford, 1637, p. 104, with textual variants.

[41] 1.21

[42] _Delectus_, pp. 396-7, 399-400, and 405. See Grotius, _op. cit._, pp. 341-2, and 383.

[43] 1.8

[44] 1.33

[45] 2.68

[46] 4.69

[47] 4.56