SATIRE VI Argument. This is one of the most pleasing and original of our author's Satires. Its primary object is to point out the proper use of riches: and the author exhibits (after a beautiful exordium, in which the genius and learning of his friend Bassus are complimented with all the warmth of friendship,) his own conduct in the regulation of his desires, as explanatory of his views. A kind and liberal attention to the necessities of others is then recommended; and the various artifices of avarice to disguise its sordid and selfish feelings under the specious names of prudence, ancient simplicity, a regard for the welfare of successors, &c. are detected and exposed with marked severity. The poem concludes with some sarcastick reproof of the greediness of heirs in expectation, and a striking description of the nature of cupidity, which strengthens with indulgence, and becomes more craving in proportion as it is more abundantly supplied. But this Satire is not only the most agreeable and original, but the most interesting of our author's works. It was evidently written by him, while yet in the flower of youth, possessed of an independent fortune, of estimable friends, of dear connections, and of a cultivated mind, under the consciousness of irrecoverable disease ;—a situation in itself sufficiently affecting, and which is rendered still more so, by the tranquil, placid, and even cheerful spirit with which every part of it is pervaded. A. PERSII FLACCI SATIRÆ. ADMOVIT AD CESIUM BASSUM. [SAT. VI. V. 1. VIT jam bruma foco te, Basse, Sabino ? VER. 2. Chased thee, my Bassus, &c.] There are so many eminent writers of this name that it becomes a matter of hazard to fix upon the individual here meant. Fortunately, as M. Sélis observes, the matter is of no very material import; though Stelluti, with the national vanity of his countrymen, prosecutes the inquiry through several pages. Baptista, who has not many followers, supposes it to be Saleius Bassus, who is celebrated in more than one place, by Tacitus, as a most excellent poet: but he was poor;-unless we take tenuis, as Madan evidently does, for slender. "Sarrano, tenuique Saleio, "Gloria quantalibet, quid erit, si gloria tantum ?" whereas the person to whom this Satire is addressed, appears to be a man of considerable property; he has a villa in the territory of the Sabines, and, if we may trust the next authority, another in Campania. According to the pseudo-Cornutus, (who was evidently in possession of much information, long since lost,) the friend of Persius was a distinguished lyrick poet, who was SATIRES OF PERSIUS. TO CESIUS BASSUS. SAT. VI. V. 1-2.] SAY, have the wintry storms, which round us beat, Chased thee, my Bassus, to thy Sabine seat? destroyed, together with his country residence, in that great eruption of Vesuvius, in which, as some say, Pliny the elder also perished. Bassus (apparently the person before us) is noticed by Quintilian, as the only lyrick poet whose odes could be borne immediately after those of Horace. He wrote, it seems, on many subjects: on the origin of things; on the gods; on the stars; &c. To some of these works, our author elegantly and poetically refers in the introductory lines of his Satire. For rerum (v. 3.) Marcilius and a few others read vocum : this delights the criticks; because they find that one Bassus wrote something on the metre of Nero, who is thus secured for the Satire, when least hoped. A composition of this kind could scarcely be very poetical, much less could it call forth the lofty terms in which Persius notices it :-but, not to trifle with the reader's patience, the work on metre just mentioned, was in prose, and is expressly said to be so by Aul. Gellius, from whom the commentators have taken the circumstance. Holyday, who Jamne lyra, et tetrico vivunt tibi pectine chordæ? Mire opifex numeris veterum primordia rerum, Atque marem strepitum fidis intendisse Latinæ ! Mox juvenes agitare jocos, et pollice honesto Egregios lusisse senes!-Mihi nunc Ligus ora Intepet, hybernatque meum mare; qua latus in gens Dant scopuli, et multa littus se valle receptat. Cor jubet hoc Ennî, postquam destertuit esse adopts the text of Marcilius, translates it, with more taste than fidelity, "Great workman! whose blest muse sweet lines affordes, Full of the native beauty of old wordes;" by which, however, he ingeniously escapes the absurdity of confounding the grammarian with the lyrick poet. VER. 2 to thy Sabine seat.] Persius had left his friend at Rome when he withdrew, for the winter months, to the coasts of Liguria; and he commences with inquiring whether the cold had driven him to follow his example, and shelter himself at his country seat. Had the weather alone been in question, Bassus would have found it quite as favourable at Rome as among the Sabine hills; but the fact was, that men of studious and retired habits, like our poets, were glad of any pretence to escape from the riotous excesses, and the anarchy of the Saturnalia. Campania offered a more genial climate; but Naples was not less disturbed by the liberty of December than the capital; and Vesuvius with its treacherous luxuriance, was preferred, in evil hour, to the rugged security of Mons Tetricus. VER. 14. Liguria's coast, &c.] Persius was fortunate in his |