The History of Roman Literature Part 26

"Quod si non aliam venturo fata Neroni Invenere viam, magnoque aeterna parantur Regna deis, caelumque suo servire Tonanti Non nisi saevorum potuit post bella Gigantum; Iam nihil O superi querimur! Scelera ipsa nefasque Hac mercede placent!"

The _Pharsalia_, then, is the outcome of a prosperous rhetorical career on the one hand, and of a bitter disappointment which finds its solace in patriotic feeling on the other. It is difficult to see how such a poem could have failed to ruin him, even if he had not been doomed before. The loss of freedom is bewailed in words, which, if declamatory, are fatally courageous, and reflect perilous honour on him that used them: [31]

"Fugiens civile nefas redituraque nunquam Libertas ultra Tigrim Rhenumque [32] recessit, Ac toties n.o.bis iugulo quaesita, vagatur, Germanum Scythic.u.mque bonum, nec respicit ultra Ausoniam."

It is true that his love for freedom, like that of Virgil, was based on an idea, not a reality. But it none the less required a great soul to utter these stirring sentiments before the very face of Nero, the "vultus instantis tyranni" of which Horace had dreamed.

On the fitness or unfitness of his theme for epic treatment no more need be added here than was said in the chapter on Virgil. It is, however, difficult to see what subject was open to the epicist after Virgil except to narrate the actual account of what Virgil had painted in ideal colours.

The calm march of government under divine guidance from Aeneas to Augustus was one side of the picture. The fierce struggles and remorseless ambition of the Civil Wars is the other. Which is the more true? It would be fairer to ask, which is the more poetical? It was Lucan's misfortune that the ideal side was already occupied; he had no power to choose. Few who have read the _Pharsalia_ would wish it unwritten. Some critics have denied that it is poetry at all. [33] Poetry of the first order it certainly is not, but those who will forgive artistic defects for energy of thought and strength of feeling must always retain a strong admiration for its n.o.ble imperfections.

We shall offer a few critical remarks on the _Pharsalia_, referring our readers for an exhaustive catalogue of its defects to M. Nisard's second volume of the _Poetes de la Decadence_, and confining ourselves princ.i.p.ally to such points as he has not dwelt upon. In the first place we observe a most unfortunate att.i.tude towards the greatest problem that can exercise man's mind, his relation to the Superior Power. Lucan has neither the reverence of Virgil, the antagonism of Lucretius, nor the awful doubt of Greek tragedy. His att.i.tude is one of pretentious rebellion and flippant accusation, except when Stoic doctrines raise him for a time above himself. He goes on every occasion quite out of his way to a.s.sail the popular ideas of providence. To Lucretius this is a necessity entailed upon him by his subject; to Lucan it is nothing but petulant rhetorical outburst. For instance, he calls Ptolemy _Fortunae pudor crimenque deorum_; [34] he arraigns the G.o.ds as caring more for vengeance than liberty; [35] he calls Septimius a disgrace to the G.o.ds, [36] the death of Pompey a tale at which heaven ought to blush; [37] he speaks of the expression on Pompey's venerable face as one of anger against the G.o.ds, [38] of the stone that marks his tomb as an indictment against heaven, [39] and hopes that it may soon be considered as false a witness of his death as Crete is to that of Jove; [40] he makes young Pompey, speaking of his father's death, say: "Whatever insult of fate has scattered his limbs to the winds, I forgive the G.o.ds that wrong, it is of what they have left that I complain;" [41] saddest of all, he gives us that tremendous epigram: [42]

"Victrix causa deis placuit, sed victa Catoni."

We recognise here a n.o.ble but misguided spirit, fretting at the dispensations it cannot approve, because it cannot understand them.

Bitterly disgusted at the failure of the Empire to fulfil all its promise, the writers of this period waste their strength in unavailing upbraidings of the G.o.ds. There is a retrograde movement of thought since the Augustan age. Virgil and Horace take substantially the same view of the Empire as that which the philosophy of history has taught us is the true one; they call it a necessity, and express that belief by deifying its representative. Contrast the spirit of Horace in the third Ode of the third book:

"Hac arte Pollux hac vagus Hercules Enisus arces attigit igneas; Quos inter Augustus rec.u.mbens Purpureo bibit ore nectar,"

with the fierce irony of Lucan: [43]

"Mortalis nulli Sunt curata deo; cladis tamen huius habemus _Vindictam_, quantam terris dare numina fas est.

Bella pares superis faciunt civilia divos; Fulminibus manes radiisque ornabit et astris, Inque Deum templis iurabit Roma per _umbras_."

Here is the satire of Cicero's second Philippic reappearing, but with added bitterness. [44] Being thus without belief in a divine providence, how does Lucan govern the world? By blind fate, or blinder caprice!

_Fortuna_, whom Juvenal ridicules, [45] is the true deity of Lucan. As such she is directly mentioned ninety-one times, besides countless others where her agency is implied. A useful belief for a man like Caesar who fought his way to empire; a most unfortunate conception for an epic poet to build a great poem on.

Lucan's scepticism has this further disadvantage that it precludes him from the use of the supernatural. To introduce the council of Olympus as Virgil does would in him be sheer mockery, and he is far too honest to attempt it. But as no great poet can dispense with some reference to the unseen, Lucan is driven to its lower and less poetic spheres. Ghosts, witches, dreams, visions, and portents, fill with their grisly catalogue a disproportionate s.p.a.ce of the poem. The sibyl is introduced as in Virgil, but instead of giving her oracle with solemn dignity, she first refuses to speak at all, then under threats of cruel punishment she submits to the influence of the G.o.d, but in the midst of the prophetic impulse, Apollo, for some unexplained reason, compels her to stop short and conceal the gist of her message. [46] Even more unpleasant is the description of s.e.xtus Pompeius's consultation of the witch Erichtho; [47] horror upon horror is piled up until the blood curdles at the sickening details, which even Southey's _Thalaba_ does not approach--and, after all, the feeling produced is not horror but disgust.

It is pleasant to turn from his irreligion to his philosophy. Here he appears as an uncertain but yet ardent disciple of the Porch. His uncertainty is shown by his inability to answer many grave doubts, as: Why is the future revealed by presages? [48] why are the oracles, once so vocal, now silent? [49] his enthusiasm by his portraiture of Cato, who was regarded by the Stoics as coming nearest of all men to their ideal Wise Man. Cato is to him a peg on which to hang the virtues and paradoxes of the school. But none the less is the sketch he gives a truly n.o.ble one: [50]

"Hi mores, haec duri immota Catonis Secta fuit, servare modum finemque tenere, Naturamque sequi, patriaeque impendere vitam, Nec sibi sed toti genitum se credere mundo."

Nothing in all Latin poetry reaches a higher pitch of ethical sublimity than Cato's reply to Labienus when entreated to consult the oracle of Jupiter Ammon: [51] "What would you have me ask? whether I ought to die rather than become a slave? whether life begins here or after death?

whether evil can hurt the good man? whether it be enough to will what is good? whether virtue is made greater by success? All this I know already, and Hammon's voice will not make it more sure. We all depend on Heaven, and though oracles be silent we cannot act without the will of G.o.d. Deity needs no witness: once for all at our birth he has given us all needful knowledge, nor has he chosen barren sands accessible to few, or buried truth in a desert. Where earth, sea, sky, and virtue exist, there is G.o.d.

Why seek we Heaven outside?" These, and similar other sentiments scattered throughout the poem, redeem it from the charge of wanton disbelief, and show a largeness of soul that only needed experience to make it truly great.

In discussing political and social questions Lucan shows considerable insight. He could not, any more than his contemporaries, understand that the old oligarchy was an anachronism; that the stubborn pride of its votaries needed the sword to break it. But the influence of individual genius is well pourtrayed by him, and he seizes character with a vigorous grasp. As a partisan of the senate, he felt bound to exalt Pompey; but if we judge by his own actions and his own words, not by the encomiums heaped on him by the poet, Lucan's Pompey comes very near the genuine historical man. So the Caesar sketched by Lucan, though meant to be a villain of the blackest dye--if we except some blood-thirsty speeches--stands out as a true giant of energy, neither meaner nor more unscrupulous than the Caesar of history. Domitius, Curio, and Lentulus, are vigorous though somewhat defective portraits. Cornelia is the only female character that calls for notice. She is drawn with breadth and sympathy, and bears all the traits of a great Roman matron. The degradation of the people is a constant theme of lamentation. It is wealth, luxury, and the effeminacy that comes with them that have softened the fibre of Rome, and made her willing to bear a master. This is indeed a common-place of the schools, but it is none the less a gloomy truth, and Lucan would have been no Roman had he omitted to complain of it. Equally characteristic is his contempt for the lower orders [52] and the influx of foreigners, of whom Rome had become the common sink. Juvenal, who evidently studied Lucan, drew from him the picture of the Tiber soiled by Orontes's foul stream, and of the Bithynian, Galatian, and Cappadocian knights. [53]

With regard to the artistic side of the poem the first and most obvious criticism is that it has no hero. But if this be a fault, it is one which it shares with the _Divina Commedia_ and _Paradise Lost_. As Satan has been called the hero of the latter poem, so Caesar, if not the hero, is the protagonist of the _Pharsalia_. But Cato, Pompey, and the senate as a body, have all competed for this honour. The fact is this: that while the primitive epic is altogether personal, the poem whose interest is national or human cannot always find a single hero. It is after all a narrow criticism that confines the poet's art within such strict limits. A great poet can hardly avoid changing or at least modifying the existing canons of art, and Lucan should at least be judged with the same liberality as the old annalists who celebrated the wars of the Republic.

In description Lucan is excellent, both in action and still life, but more in brilliancy of detail than in broad effects. His defect lies in the tone of exaggeration which he has acquired in the schools, and thinks it right to employ in order not to fall below his subject. He has a true opinion of the importance of the Civil War, which he judges to be the final crisis of Rome's history, and its issues fraught with superhuman grandeur. The innate materialism of his mind, however, leads him to attach _outward_ magnitude to all that is connected with it. Thus Nero, the offspring of its throes, is entreated by the poet to be careful, when he leaves earth to take his place among the immortals, not to seat himself in a quarter where his weight may disturb the just equilibrium of the globe! [54] And, similarly, all the incidents of the Civil War exceed the parallel incidents of every other war in terror and vastness. Do portents presage a combat? they are such as defy all power to conceive. Pindus mounts upon Olympus, [55] and others of a more ordinary but still amazing character follow. [56] Does a naval conflict take place? the horrors of all the elements combine to make it the most hideous that the mind can imagine.

Fire and water vie with each other in devising new modes of death, and where these are inactive, it is only because a land-battle with all its carnage is being enacted on the closely-wedged ships. [57] Has the army to march across a desert? the entire race of venomous serpents conspires to torture and if possible extirpate the host! [58] This is a very inartistic mode of heightening effect, and, indeed, borders closely on that pursued in the modern _sensation_ novel. It is beyond question the worst defect of the _Pharsalia_, and the extraordinary ingenuity with which it is done only intensifies the misconduct of the poet.

Over and above this habitual exaggeration, Lucan has a decided love for the ghastly and revolting. The instances to which allusion has already been made, viz. the Thessalian sorceress and the dreadful casualties of the sea-fight, show it very strikingly, but the account of the serpents in the Libyan desert, if possible, still more. The episode is of great length, over three hundred lines, and contains much mythological knowledge, as well as an appalling power of description. It begins with a discussion of the question, Why is Africa so full of these plagues? After giving various hypotheses he adopts the one which a.s.signs their origin to Medusa's hairs which fell from Perseus's hand as he sailed through the air. In order not to lure people to certain death by appearing in an inhabited country, he chose the trackless wastes of Africa over which to wing his flight. The mythological disquisition ended, one on natural history follows. The peculiar properties of the venom of each species are minutely catalogued, first in abstract terms, then in the concrete by a description of their effects on some of Cato's soldiers. The first bitten was the standard-bearer Aulus, by a dipsas, which afflicted him with intolerable thirst; next Sabellus by a seps, a minute creature whose bite was followed by an instantaneous corruption of the whole body; [59] then Nasidius by a prester which caused his form to swell to an unrecognisable size, and so on through the list of serpents, each episode closing with a brilliant epigram which clenches the effect. [60] Trivialities like these would spoil the greatest poem ever penned. It need not be said that they spoil the _Pharsalia_.

Another subject on which Lucan rings the changes is death. The word _mors_ has an unwholesome attraction to his ear. Death is to him the greatest gift of heaven; the only one it cannot take away. It is sad indeed to hear the young poet uttering sentiments like this: [61]

"Scire mori sors prima viris, sed proxima cogi,"

and again [62]--

"Victurosque dei celant, ut vivere durent, Felix esse mori."

So in cursing Crastinus, Caesar's fierce centurion, he wishes him not to die, but to retain sensibility after death, in other words to be immortal.

The sentiment occurs, not once but a hundred times, that of all pleasures death is the greatest. He even plays upon the word, using it in senses which it will hardly bear. _Libycae mortes_ are serpents; _Accessit morti Libye_, "Libya added to the mortality of the army;" _nulla cruentae tantum mortis habet_; "no other reptile causes a death so b.l.o.o.d.y." To one so unhealthily familiar with the idea, the reality, when it came, seems to have brought unusual terrors.

The learning of Lucan has been much extolled, and in some respects not without reason. It is complex, varied, and allusive, but its extreme obscurity makes us suspect even when we cannot prove, inaccuracy. He is proud of his manifold acquirements. Nothing pleases him more than to have an excuse for showing his information on some abstruse subject. The causes of the climate of Africa, the meteorological conditions of Spain, the theory of the globes, the geography of the southern part of our hemisphere, the wonders of Egypt and the views about the source of the Nile, are descanted on with diffuse erudition. But it is evidently impossible that so mere a youth could have had a deep knowledge of so many subjects, especially as his literary productiveness had already been very great. He had written an _Iliacon_ according to Statius, [63] a book of _Saturnalia_, ten books of _Silvae_, a _Catachthonion_, an unfinished tragedy called _Medea_, fourteen _Salticae fabulae_ (no doubt out of compliment to Nero), a prose essay against Octavius Sagitta, another in favour of him, a poem _De Incendio Urbis_, in which Nero was satirised, a _katakausmos_ (which is perhaps different from the latter, but may be only the same under another t.i.tle), a series of letters from Campania, and an address to his wife, Polla Argentaria.

A peculiar, and to us offensive, exhibition of learning consists in those tirades on common-place themes, embodying all the stock current of instances, of which the earliest example is found in the catalogue of the dead in Virgil's _Culex_. Lucan, as may be supposed, delights in dressing up these well-worn themes, painting them with novel splendour if they are descriptive, thundering in fiery epigrams, if they are moral. Of the former cla.s.s are two of the most effective scenes in the poem. The first is Caesar's night voyage in a skiff over a stormy sea. The fisherman to whom he applies is unwilling to set sail. The night, he says, shows many threatening signs, and, by way of deterring Caesar, he enumerates the entire list of prognostics to be found in Aratus, Hesiod, and Virgil, with great piquancy of touch, but without the least reference to the propriety of the situation. [64] Nothing can be more amusing, or more out of place, than the old man's sudden erudition. The second is the death of Scaeva, who for a time defended Caesar's camp single-handed. The poet first remarks that valour in a bad cause is a crime, and then depicts that of Scaeva in such colossal proportions as almost pa.s.s the limits of burlesque. After describing him as pierced with so many spears that they served him _as armour_, he adds: [65]

"Nec quicquam nudis vitalibus obstat Iam, praeter stantes in _summis ossibus_ hastas."

This is grotesque enough; the banquet of birds and beasts who feed on the skin of Pharsalia is even worse. [66] The details are too loathsome to quote. Suffice it to say that the list includes every carrion-feeder among flesh and fowl who a.s.semble in immense flocks:

"Nunquam tanto se vulture caelum _Induit_, aut plures _presserunt_ aethere pennae."

We have, however, dwelt too long on points like these. We must now notice a few features of his style which mark him as the representative of an epoch. First, his extreme cleverness. In splendid extravagance of expression no Latin author comes near him. The miniature painting of Statius, the point of Martial, are both feeble in comparison; for Lucan's language, though often tasteless, is always strong. Some of his lines embody a condensed trenchant vigour which has made them proverbs. Phrases like _Trahimur sub nomine pacis--Momentumque fuit mutatus Curio rerum_, recall the pen of Tacitus. Others are finer still Caesar's energy is rivalled by the line--

"Nil actum credens dum quid superesset agendum."

The duty of securing liberty, even at the cost of blood, was never more finely expressed than by the n.o.ble words:

"Ignoratque datos ne quisquam serviat enses."

Curio's treachery is pilloried in the epigram,

"Emere omnes, hic vendidit Urbem." [67]

The mingled cowardice and folly of servile obedience is n.o.bly expressed by his reproach to the people:

"Usque adeone times, quem tu facis ipse timendum?" [68]

An author who could write like this had studied rhetoric to some purpose.

Unhappily he is oftener diffuse than brief, and sometimes he becomes tedious to the last degree. His poetical art is totally deficient in variety. He knows of but one method of gaining effect, the use of strong language and plenty of it. If Persius was inflated with the vain desire to surpa.s.s Horace, Lucan seems to have been equally ambitious of excelling Virgil. He rarely imitates, but he frequently competes with him. Over and over again, he approaches the same or similar subjects. Virgil had described the victory of Hercules over Cacus, Lucan must celebrate his conflict with Antaeus; Virgil had mentioned the portents that followed Caesar's death, Lucan must repeat them with added improbabilities in a fresh context; his sibyl is but a tasteless counterpart of Virgil's; his catalogues of forces have Virgil's constantly in view; his deification of Nero is an exaggeration of that of Augustus, and even the celebrated simile in which Virgil admits his obligations to the Greek stage has its parallel in the _Pharsalia_. [69]

Nevertheless Lucan is of all Latin poets the most independent in relation to his predecessors. It needs a careful criticism to detect his knowledge and imitation of Virgil. As far as other poets go he might never have read their works. The impetuous course of the _Pharsalia_ is interrupted by no literary reminiscences, no elaborate setting of antique gems. He was a stranger to that fond pleasure with which Virgil entwined his poetry round the spreading branches of the past, and wove himself a wreath out of flowers new and old. This lack of delicate feeling is no less evident in his rhythm. Instead of the inextricable harmonies of Virgil's cadence, we have a succession of rich, forcible, and polished monotonous lines, rushing on without a thought of change until the period closes. In formal skill Lucan was a proficient, but his ear was dull. The same caesuras recur again and again, [70] and the only merit of his rhythm is its undeniable originality. [71] The composition of the _Pharsalia_ must, however, have been extremely hurried, judging both from the fact that three books only were finished the year before the poet's death, and from various indications of haste in the work itself. The tenth book is obviously unfinished, and in style is far more careless than the rest.

Lucan's diction is tolerably cla.s.sical, but he is lax in the employment of certain words, _e.g. mors, fatum, pati_ (in the sense of _vivere_), and affects forced combinations from the desire to be terse, _e.g., degener toga_, [72] _stimulis negare_, [73] _nutare regna_, "to portend the advent of despotism;" [74] _meditari Leucada_, "to intend to bring about the catastrophe of Actium," [75] and so on. We observe also several innovations in syntax, especially the freer use of the infinitive (_vivere durent_) after verbs, or as a substantive, a defect he shares with Persius (_scire tuum_); and the employment of the future participle to state a possibility or a condition that might have been fulfilled, _e.g., unumque caput tam magna iuventus Privatum_ factura _timet velut ensibus ipse Imperet invito_ moturus _milite bellum_. [76] A strong depreciation of Lucan's genius has been for some time the rule of criticism. And in an age when little time is allowed for reading any but the best authors, it is perhaps undesirable that he should be rehabilitated. Yet throughout the Middle Ages and during more than one great epoch in French history, he was ranked among the highest epic poets. Even now there are many scholars who greatly admire him. The false metaphor and exaggerated tone may be condoned to a youth of twenty-six; the lofty pride and bold devotion to liberty could not have been acquired by an ign.o.ble spirit. He is of value to science as a moderately accurate historian who supplements Caesar's narrative, and gives a faithful picture of the feeling general among the n.o.bility of his day. He is also a prominent representative of that gifted Spanish family who, in various ways, exercised so immense an influence on subsequent Roman letters. His wife is said to have a.s.sisted in the composition of the poem, but in what part of it her talents fitted her to succeed we cannot even conjecture.

To Nero's reign are probably to be referred the seven eclogues of T.

CALPURNIUS SICULUS, and the poem on Aetna, long attributed to Virgil.

These may bear comparison in respect of their want of originality with the _Satires_ of Persius, though both fall far short of them in talent and interest. The MSS. of Calpurnius contain, besides the seven genuine poems, four others by a later and much inferior writer, probably Nemesia.n.u.s, the same who wrote a poem on the chase in the reign of Numerian. These are imitated from Calpurnius much as he imitates Virgil, except that the decline in metrical treatment is greater. The first eclogue of Calpurnius is devoted to the praises of a young emperor who is to regenerate the world, and exercise a wisdom, a clemency, and a patronage of the arts long unknown. He is celebrated again in Eclogue IV., the most pretentious of the series, and, in general, critics are agreed that Nero is intended. The second poem is the most successful of all, and a short account of it may be given here. Astacus and Idas, two beauteous youths, enter into a poetical contest at which Thyrsis acts as judge. Faunus, the satyrs, and nymphs, "Sicco Dryades pede Naides udo," are present. The rivers stay their course; the winds are hushed; the oxen forget their pasture; the bee steadies itself on poised wing to listen. An amoebean contest ensues, in which the rivals closely imitate those of Virgil's seventh eclogue, singing against one another in stanzas of four lines. Thyrsis declines to p.r.o.nounce either conqueror:

"Este pares: et ab hoc concordes vivite: nam vos Et decor et cantus et amor sociavit et aetas."

The rhythm is pleasing; the style simple and flowing; and if we did not possess the model we might admire the copy. The tone of exaggeration which characterises all the poetry of Nero's time mars the reality of these pastoral scenes. The author professes great reverence for Virgil, but does not despair of being coupled with him (vi. 64):

"Magna petis Corydon, si t.i.tyrus esse laboras."