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INSTANCES OF RHYTHMICAL VERSE.

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for a rhythm consisting of alternate beats, which pervades most modern poetry.

The empire had become so extensive, that the taste of the people, especially of the provincials, was no longer regulated by that of the capital, and emphasis and accent became, instead of metrical quantity, the general rule of pronunciation. This was the origin of rhythmical poetry. Traces of it may be found as early as the satirical verses of Suetonius or J. Cæsar.

It is the metre of the little jeu d'esprit addressed by the emperor Hadrian to Florus-1

Ego nolo Florus esse
Ambulare per tabernas,
Latitare per popinas
Culius pati rotundos;

and also of the historian's repartee

Ego nolo Cæsar esse
Ambulare per Britannos,

Scythicas pati pruinas.

The simple grandeur of such strains as

Dies iræ, dies illa,

Solvet sæclum in favilla, &c.,

and other monkish hymns, go far to rescue the old Saturnian from the charge of ruggedness and rusticity ascribed to it by Horace and others, whose taste was formed by Greek poetry, and whose fastidious ears could not brook any harmony but that which had been consecrated to the outpourings of Greek genius.

From this species of verse, which probably prevailed among the natives of Provence (the Roman Provincia), the Troubadours derived the metre of their ballad poetry, and thence introduced it into the rest of Europe. But whatever phases the external form of ancient poetry underwent, the classical writers both of Greece and Rome eschewed rhyme. Even to a modern ear the beautiful effect of the ancient metres is entirely destroyed by it. It was a false taste and a less refined ear which could accept it as a compensation for the imperfections of prosody.

Although rhyme was introduced as an embellishment of verses framed on the principle of ictus, and not of quantity, at a very early period of Christian Latin literature, it is not quite certain when it came to be added as a new difficulty to the metres of classical antiquity. It is recorded by Gray2 that when the children

1 See Meyer, Anthol. Lat., 207, 212.

2 Gray's Works, ii. 30-54.

educated in the monastery of St. Gall addressed a Bishop of Constance on his first visitation with expostulatory orations, the younger ones recited the following doggerel rhymes:

Quid tibi fecimus tale ut nobis facias male

Appellamus regem quia nostram fecimus legem.

The elder and more advanced students spoke in rhyming hexa

meters:

Non nobis pia spes fuerat cum sis novus hospes
Ut vetus in pejus transvertere tute velis jus.

THREE PERIODS OF ROMAN LITERATURE.

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CHAPTER IV.

THREE PERIODS OF ROMAN CLASSICAL LITERATURE-ITS ELEMENTS RUDE-ROMAN RELIGION ETRUSCAN INFLUENCE-EARLY HISTORICAL MONUMENTS-FESCENNINE VERSES -FABULE ATELLANE-INTRODUCTION OF STAGE PLAYERS-DERIVATION OF SATIRE.

THE era during which Roman classical literature commenced,' arrived at perfection, and declined, may be conveniently divided into three periods. The first of these embraces its rise and progress, such traces as are discoverable of oral and traditional compositions, the rude elements of the drama, the introduction of Greek literature, and the cultivation of the national taste in accordance with this model, the infancy of eloquence, and the construction and perfection of comedy.

To this period the first five centuries of the republic may be considered as introductory; the groundwork and foundation were then being gradually laid on which the superstructure was built up; for, properly speaking, Rome had no literature until the conclusion of the first Punic war.1

Independently, therefore, of these 500 years, this period consists of 160 years, extending from the time when Livius Andronicus flourished to the first appearance of Cicero in public life.3 The second period ends with the death of Augustus. It comprehends the age of which Cicero is the representative, as the most accomplished orator, philosopher, and prose writer of his times, as well as that of Augustus, which is commonly called the golden age of Latin poetry.

The third and last period of Roman classical literature terminates with the death of Hadrian. Notwithstanding the numerous excellencies which will be seen to distinguish the literature of this period, its decline had evidently commenced. It missed the patronage of Augustus and his refined court, and was chilled by the baneful influence of his tyrannical successors. As the age of Augustus has been distinguished by the epithet "golden," so

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the succeeding period has been, on account of its comparative inferiority, designated as "the silver age."

The Romans, like all other nations, had oral poetical compositions before they possessed any written literature. Cicero, in three places,' speaks of the banquet being enlivened by the songs of bards, in which the exploits of heroes were recited and celebrated. By these lays national pride and family vanity were gratified, and the anecdotes thus preserved by memory furnished the sources of early legendary history.

In

But these lays and legends must not be compared to those of Greece, which had probably taken an epic form long before they furnished the groundwork of the Iliad and the Odyssey. Roman tradition there are no traces of elevated genius or poetical inspiration. The religious sentiment was the fertile source of Greek fancy, which gave a supernatural glory to the effusions of the bard, painted men as heroes, and heroes as deities; and, whilst it was the natural growth of the Greek intellect, twined itself round the affections of the whole people.

Roman religion was a ceremonial for the priests, not for the people; and its poetry was merely formula in verse, and soared no higher than the semi-barbarous ejaculations of the Salian priests or the Arvalian brotherhood. Fabulous legends doubtless formed the groundwork of history, and therefore probably constituted the festive entertainments to which Cicero alludes: but they were rude and simple, and the narratives founded upon them, which are embodied in the pages of Livy and others, are as much improved by the embellishments of the historian, as these in their turn have been expanded by the poetic talent of Macaulay.

It is scarcely possible to conceive that the uncouth literature which was contemporary with such rude relics as have come down to modern times should have displayed a higher degree of imaginative power. A few simple descriptive lines, one or two animating and heart-stirring sentiments, and no more, would be tolerated as an interruption to the grosser pleasures of the table amongst a rude and boisterous people. The Romans were men of actions, not of words; their intellect, though vigorous, was essentially of a practical character: it was such as to form warriors, statesmen, jurists, orators, but not poets, in the highest sense of the word, i. e. if by poetic talent is meant the creative faculty of the imagination. The Roman mind possessed the germs of those faculties which admit of cultivation and improvement,

1 Brut. 19; Tusc. Dis. i. 2; iv. 2.

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RUDE ELEMENTS OF ROMAN LITERATURE.

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such as taste and genius, and the appreciation of the beautiful, and their endowments rendered them capable of attaining literary excellence; it did not possess the natural gifts of fancy and imagination, which were part and parcel of the Greek mind, and which made them in a state of infancy, almost of barbarism, a poetical people.

With the Romans literature was not of spontaneous growth; it was the result of external influence. It is impossible to fix the period at which they first became subject to this influence, but it is clear that in everything mental and spiritual their neighbors the Etruscans were their teachers. The influence exercised by this remarkable people was not only religious, but moral: its primary object was discipline, its secondary one refinement. If it cultivated the intellectual powers, it was with a view to disciplining the moral faculties. To this pure culture the old Roman character owed its vigor, its honesty, its incorruptible sternness, and those virtues which are summed up in the comprehensive and truly Roman word "gravitas." History proves that these qualities had a real existence-that they were not the mere ideal phantasies of those who loved to praise times gone by. The error into which those fell who mourned over the loss of the old Roman discipline, and lamented the degeneracy of their own times, was, that they attributed this degeneracy to the onward march of refinement and civilization, and not to the accidental circumstance that this march was accompanied by profligacy and effeminacy, and that the race which was the dispensers of these blessings was a corrupt and degenerate one. They could not separate the causes and the effects; they did not see that Rome was intellectually advanced by Greek literature, but that unfortunately it was degraded at the same time by Greek profligacy.

For centuries the Roman mind was imbued with Etruscan literature; and Livy' asserts that, just as Greek was in his own day, it continued to be the instrument of Roman education during five centuries after the foundation of the city.

The tendency of the Roman mind was essentially utilitarian. Even Cicero, with all his varied accomplishments, will recognize but one end and object of all study, namely, those sciences which will render a man useful to his country;-"Quid esse igitur censes discendum nobis? Eas artes quæ efficiunt ut usui civitati simus; id enim esse præclarissimum sapientiæ munus maximumque virtutis vel documentum vel officium puto." We must, therefore, expect to find the law of literary development modified

Lib. ix. 36.

2 De Rep. i. 20.

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