On the Sublime Part 9

4 These details might have been given in one or two broad strokes, as when he speaks of mounds being heaped together. So in dealing with the other preparations he might have told us of "waggons and camels and a long train of baggage animals loaded with all kinds of supplies for the luxury and enjoyment of the table," or have mentioned "piles of grain of every species, and of all the choicest delicacies required by the art of the cook or the taste of the epicure," or (if he must needs be so very precise) he might have spoken of "whatever dainties are supplied by those who lay or those who dress the banquet."

5 In our sublimer efforts we should never stoop to what is sordid and despicable, unless very hard pressed by some urgent necessity. If we would write becomingly, our utterance should be worthy of our theme. We should take a lesson from nature, who when she planned the human frame did not set our grosser parts, or the ducts for purging the body, in our face, but as far as she could concealed them, "diverting," as Xenophon says, "those ca.n.a.ls as far as possible from our senses,"[2] and thus shunning in any part to mar the beauty of the whole creature.

[Footnote 2: _Mem._ i. 4. 6.]

6 However, it is not inc.u.mbent on us to specify and enumerate whatever diminishes a style. We have now pointed out the various means of giving it n.o.bility and loftiness. It is clear, then, that whatever is contrary to these will generally degrade and deform it.

XLIV

There is still another point which remains to be cleared up, my dear Terentian, and on which I shall not hesitate to add some remarks, to gratify your inquiring spirit. It relates to a question which was recently put to me by a certain philosopher. "To me," he said, "in common, I may say, with many others, it is a matter of wonder that in the present age, which produces many highly skilled in the arts Of popular persuasion, many of keen and active powers, many especially rich in every pleasing gift of language, the growth of highly exalted and wide-reaching genius has with a few rare exceptions almost entirely ceased. So universal is the dearth of eloquence which prevails throughout the world.

2 "Must we really," he asked, "give credit to that oft-repeated a.s.sertion that democracy is the kind nurse of genius, and that high literary excellence has flourished with her prime and faded with her decay?

Liberty, it is said, is all-powerful to feed the aspirations of high intellects, to hold out hope, and keep alive the flame of mutual rivalry and ambitious struggle for the highest place.

3 "Moreover, the prizes which are offered in every free state keep the spirits of her foremost orators whetted by perpetual exercise;[1] they are, as it were, ignited by friction, and naturally blaze forth freely because they are surrounded by freedom. But we of to-day," he continued, "seem to have learnt in our childhood the lessons of a benignant despotism, to have been cradled in her habits and customs from the time when our minds were still tender, and never to have tasted the fairest and most fruitful fountain of eloquence, I mean liberty. Hence we develop nothing but a fine genius for flattery.

[Footnote 1: Comp. Pericles in Thuc. ii., ???a ??? ??? ?e?ta? ??et??

???sta t??? d? ?a? ??d?e? ???sta p???te???s??.]

4 "This is the reason why, though all other faculties are consistent with the servile condition, no slave ever became an orator; because in him there is a dumb spirit which will not be kept down: his soul is chained: he is like one who has learnt to be ever expecting a blow. For, as Homer says--

5 "'The day of slavery Takes half our manly worth away.'[2]

"As, then (if what I have heard is credible), the cages in which those pigmies commonly called dwarfs are reared not only stop the growth of the imprisoned creature, but absolutely make him smaller by compressing every part of his body, so all despotism, however equitable, may be defined as a cage of the soul and a general prison."

[Footnote 2: _Od._ xvii. 322.]

6 My answer was as follows: "My dear friend, it is so easy, and so characteristic of human nature, always to find fault with the present.[3] Consider, now, whether the corruption of genius is to be attributed, not to a world-wide peace,[4] but rather to the war within us which knows no limit, which engages all our desires, yes, and still further to the bad pa.s.sions which lay siege to us to-day, and make utter havoc and spoil of our lives. Are we not enslaved, nay, are not our careers completely shipwrecked, by love of gain, that fever which rages unappeased in us all, and love of pleasure?--one the most debasing, the other the most ign.o.ble of the mind's diseases.

[Footnote 3: Comp. Byron, "The good old times,--all times when old are good."]

[Footnote 4: A euphemism for "a world-wide tyranny."]

7 "When I consider it I can find no means by which we, who hold in such high honour, or, to speak more correctly, who idolise boundless riches, can close the door of our souls against those evil spirits which grow up with them. For Wealth unmeasured and unbridled is dogged by Extravagance: she sticks close to him, and treads in his footsteps: and as soon as he opens the gates of cities or of houses she enters with him and makes her abode with him. And after a time they build their nests (to use a wise man's words[5]) in that corner of life, and speedily set about breeding, and beget Boastfulness, and Vanity, and Wantonness, no base-born children, but their very own. And if these also, the offspring of Wealth, be allowed to come to their prime, quickly they engender in the soul those pitiless tyrants, Violence, and Lawlessness, and Shamelessness.

[Footnote 5: Plato, _Rep._ ix. 573, E.]

8 "Whenever a man takes to worshipping what is mortal and irrational[6] in him, and neglects to cherish what is immortal, these are the inevitable results. He never looks up again; he has lost all care for good report; by slow degrees the ruin of his life goes on, until it is consummated all round; all that is great in his soul fades, withers away, and is despised.

[Footnote 6: Reading ?????ta.]

9 "If a judge who pa.s.ses sentence for a bribe can never more give a free and sound decision on a point of justice or honour (for to him who takes a bribe honour and justice must be measured by his own interests), how can we of to-day expect, when the whole life of each one of us is controlled by bribery, while we lie in wait for other men's death and plan how to get a place in their wills, when we buy gain, from whatever source, each one of us, with our very souls in our slavish greed, how, I say, can we expect, in the midst of such a moral pestilence, that there is still left even one liberal and impartial critic, whose verdict will not be bia.s.sed by avarice in judging of those great works which live on through all time?

10 "Alas! I fear that for such men as we are it is better to serve than to be free. If our appet.i.tes were let loose altogether against our neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and bring a deluge of calamity on the whole civilised world."

11 I ended by remarking generally that the genius of the present age is wasted by that indifference which with a few exceptions runs through the whole of life. If we ever shake off our apathy[7] and apply ourselves to work, it is always with a view to pleasure or applause, not for that solid advantage which is worthy to be striven for and held in honour.

[Footnote 7: Comp. Thuc. vi. 26. 2, for this sense of ??a?a??e??.]

12 We had better then leave this generation to its fate, and turn to what follows, which is the subject of the pa.s.sions, to which we promised early in this treatise to devote a separate work.[8] They play an important part in literature generally, and especially in relation to the Sublime.

[Footnote 8: iii. 5.]

NOTES ON LONGINUS

[Transcriber's Note: Citation format is as in the printed text. The last number in each group appears to refer to clauses in the original Greek; there is no correspondence with line numbers in the printed book.]

I. 2. 10.

There seems to be an ant.i.thesis implied in p???t????? te?e??????a?, referring to the well-known distinction between the p?a?t???? ??? and the ?e???t???? ???.

4. 27.

I have ventured to return to the original reading, d?ef?t?se?, though all editors seem to have adopted the correction d?ef???se?, on account, I suppose, of s??pt??. To _illumine_ a large subject, as a landscape is lighted up at night by a flash of lightning, is surely a far more vivid and intelligible expression than to _sweep away_ a subject.[1]

[Footnote 1: Comp. for the metaphor Goethe, _Dichtung und Wahrheit_, B 8. "Wie vor einem Blitz erleuchteten sich uns alle Folgen dieses herrlichen Gedankens."]

III. 2. 17.

f??e??? d? ?te?, lit. "without a cheek-strap," which was worn by trumpeters to a.s.sist them in regulating their breath. The line is contracted from two of Sophocles's, and Longinus's point is that the extravagance of Cleitarchus is not that of a strong but ill-regulated nature, but the ludicrous straining after grandeur of a writer at once feeble and pretentious.

Ruhnken gives an extract from some inedited "versus politici" of Tzetzes, in which are some amusing specimens of those felicities of language Longinus is here laughing at. Stones are the "bones," rivers the "veins," of the earth; the moon is "the sigma of the sky" (? the old form of S); sailors, "the ants of ocean"; the strap of a pedlar's pack, "the girdle of his load"; pitch, "the ointment of doors," and so on.

IV. 4. 4.

The play upon the double meaning of ???a, (1) maiden, (2) pupil of the eye, can hardly be kept in English. It is worthy of remark that our text of Xenophon has ?? t??? ?a?????, a perfectly natural expression. Such a variation would seem to point to a very early corruption of ancient ma.n.u.scripts, or to extraordinary inaccuracy on the part of Longinus, who, indeed, elsewhere displays great looseness of citation, confusing together totally different pa.s.sages.

9.

?ta??. I can make nothing of this word. Various corrections have been suggested, but with little certainty.

5. 10.

?? f????? t???? ?fapt?e???, literally, "as though he were laying hands on a piece of stolen property." The point seems to be, that plagiarists, like other robbers, show no discrimination in their pilferings, seizing what comes first to hand.

VIII. 1. 20.

?d?f???. I have avoided the rather harsh confusion of metaphor which this word involves, taken in connection with p??a?.

IX. 2. 13.

?p???a, properly an "echo," a metaphor rather Greek than English.

X. 2. 13.

?????t??a d? p??a?, lit. "more wan than gra.s.s"--of the sickly yellow hue which would appear on a dark Southern face under the influence of violent emotion.[2]