composition we find also intimated in the following passage, where he records his attempts in Greek verse, and the judicious reproof, (for better effect assigned to Romulus,) by which he was deterred from pursuing that design. 1 S. x. 31-35. Atque ego cum Græcos facerem, natus mare citra, Post mediam noctem visus, cum somnia vera : In silvam non ligna feras insanius, ac si ..... During his stay in Athens that city would doubtless gratify his natural taste for retirement, as the Vacuum Tibur (1 E. VII. 45.) afterwards did in more settled indulgence. 2 E. 11. 81, 2. Ingenium, sibi quod vacuas desumsit Athenas, Horace might in B. c. 45. have formed acquaintance with the son of Cicero, somewhat his senior, who was sent to Athens in the April of that year: but not a vestige exists of any such fact. The Messala and Bibulus, so splendidly grouped in the list of his friends, 1'S. x. 81-6, &c., (a Locus Classicus in the biography of Horace,) we may fairly presume to have been there and well known to him; for Tully tells us, that two young men of those very names, very soon after his son went, were going to that celebrated seat of learning2. Of all the Sodales of Horace, however, not one seems to have been more dearly beloved by him, and in all probability on an early friendship, commenced (as we say) when at College together, than Pompeius Varus; who must on no account be confounded with Pompeius Grosphus, a very worthy man, who at that time (2 C. xvi. 33.) and several years after (1 E. XII. 22.) resided in Sicily. This Pompeius, distinguished also on good authority by the cognomen Varus, (vid. Torrentius,) was just then happily restored a Middleton's Life of Cicero. Vol. 11. p. 364. ed. 1742. e "Diis patriis Italoque cœlo," to the great delight of his friend Horace. That Ode, O sæpe mecum, which after so many years of long separation records the joyful hour of their meeting again, is imbued with all the spirit of the kind-hearted man and the convivial bard. As an authentic record also (in part) of Horace's own history, it is invaluable; ranking indeed with those principal sources of authentic intelligence, Nunc ad me redeo...1 S. vi. 45–131. and Romæ nutriri...2 E. 11. 41-52. With a verse in that Epistle it may be worth the while to compare two lines of the Ode, as no bad example of Horace tracked in his own snow. v. 47. Unda fretis tulit æstuosis. Civilisque rudem belli tulit æstus in arma, &c. The bad conscience or the diseased mind, the Atra Cura, of our Poet may be similarly traced, and not without interest, through the different stages of its progress. 2 S. VII. 114, 5.-2 C. xvi. 21, 2.—3 C. 1. 39, 40.-4 C. XI. 35, 6. That splendid imagination reached its acme in the third of those passages. vv. 37-40. Sed Timor et Minæ Decedit æratâ triremi, et Post equitem sedet atra Cura. Though in less interesting parallels, the Scholar with Horace's writings in true succession placed before him, may derive some amusement from tracing in different stages the remarkable similitude of sentiment: the following instances may deserve attention. (1) Ep. xv11. 65. Optat quietem Pelopis infidus pater, &c. (2) 2 S. 111. 91, 2. quoad vixit, credidit ingens Pauperiem vitium, et cavit nihil acrius, &c. 3 C. XXIV. 42. Magnum pauperies opprobrium jubet Quidvis et facere et pati. Or even the humbler similitude of the family table; as where Horace describes Ofellus, 2 S. 11. 116, 7. Non ego, narrantem, temere edi luce profestâ Quicquam præter olus, fumosæ cum pede pernæ. and where he sighs for his own hospitable board in the country, 2 S. VI. 63, 4. O quando faba Pythagoræ cognata, simulque About this period of the life of Horace, from his first residence in Athens to the battle of Philippi inclusive, the following notice of different places which he appears to have visited, will be quite sufficient for any illustration of his character or writings to be derived from that source. 1 C. vII. 10-14. Me neque tam patiens Lacedæmon, Quam domus Albuneæ resonantis, 1 S. VII. 4, 5. Persius hic permagna negotia dives habebat -23, 4. Clazomenis, etiam lites cum Rege molestas. laudat Brutum, laudatque cohortem, Solem Asia Brutum appellat. In a manner quite incidental and oblique we gain another fact of locality, from the Epistle (x1.) to Bullatius. Horace, after several questions put to his whimsical and odd tempered friend then on the coast of Asia, at last thus asks him: v. 6. An Lebedum laudas, odio maris atque viarum? This question apparently was meant to hit the very point of his friend's absurdity in acting as he did. Horace then supposes Bullatius thus to reply to him, as equally with himself knowing the spot alluded to, vv. 7-10. Scis, Lebedus quid sit; Gabiis desertior atque Fidenis vicus: tamen illic vivere vellem ; But here again, Horace most acutely and sensibly rejoins, vv. 11, 12. Sed neque qui Capuâ Romam petit imbre lutoque Aspersus, volet in cauponâ vivere; nec qui, &c. &c. The dialogue of the Epistle thus analysed may be taken to exemplify a great peculiarity in the manner of Horace; I mean, in the delicate, sudden, and slightly marked transitions, of which his readers have justly to complain. The abrupt and involved style of the Satires on this ground alone affords frequent matter of obscurity and doubt: while in the high-finished and perspicuous composition (generally so) of the Epistles, difficulty from that cause very seldom occurs. If there be any truth in these principles of criticism, no scholar with any judgment or taste to discriminate could possibly imagine, for instance, that the Satire which ends, 2 S. VIII. 95. Canidia adflasset, pejor serpentibus atris, and the Epistle which begins, I E. 1. 1. Primâ dicte mihi, summâ dicende Camœnâ, were ever written in continuity, as they have stood hitherto edited. For with all his recorded slowness of revision in satiric writing, (2 S. 111. 2. scriptorum quæque retexens,) the great and striking difference, so visible now, in the whole tone and style of composition betwixt the Satire and the Epistle loudly forbids such an idea. Horace in the inter val between those two books (as it is well remarked by Bentley, ante p. 5, ¶ 7.) had evidently become both an older man and a sounder as well as a more elegant writer. To return to Athens: early in B. c. 43. on the arrival of Brutus, then raising an army to oppose the second triumvirate, "all the young nobility and gentry of Rome" (in the old Pompeian interest) whom he found in that seat of education, most readily joined his standard. The son of the illustrious Cicero, we know, became a Legatus under him: young Horace, catching the spirit of his associates, naturally entered the service, and with the rank of military tribune, but not without some jealousy on that account, as we are told, in certain persons of high birth. 1 S. VI. 48. Quod mihi pareret legio Romana tribuno. In the course of those campaigns, as is acutely observed by Masson, (Horatii Vita, 1708. p. 55,) he must have seen much variety of hard service: he could not else have addressed his friend Pompeius in language like this. 2 C. vII. 1, 2. O sæpe mecum tempus in ultimum And we gather from the sketch of his own character, (1 E. xx. 23. Me primis urbis belli placuisse domique,) that he could long afterwards refer with satisfaction to the favour of the commander-in-chief enjoyed at that period. The great battle of Philippi took place towards the end of the year B. c. 42; and Horace shared in the common ruin of the unfortunate Republicans. The proscription, perhaps, did not reach him in the confiscation he certainly was involved. Of the worse consequences of that battle to himself he speaks thus: Hooke. B. x.. Ch. XIII. |