90

"I'll be silent."

95

"Go on

triental

100

replies the physician," go on your own way-I shall say no more.' 98. Turgid with dainties.] Having his stomach and bowels full of meat and drink.

-A white belly.] When the liver, or spleen, is distempered, as in the dropsy, and the chyle is not turned into blood, it circulates in the veins and small vessels of the skin, and gives the whole body a white or pallid appearance. Thus HoR. lib. ii. ode ii.

Crescit indulgens sibi dirus hydrops,
Nec sitim pellit, nisi causa morbi
Fugerit venis, et aquosus albo
Corpore lunguor.

-Is bathed.] i. e. He persists in going into the bath in this manner, notwithstanding the warning which had been given him.

99. His throat slowly exhaling, &c.] The fumes of the meat and drink ascend out of the stomach into the throat, from whence they leisurely discharge themselves in filthy steams. Mephitis signifies a stink, particularly a damp, or strong sulphureous smell arising from corrupted water. See En. vii. 1. 84. Mephitis was a name of Juno, because she was supposed to preside over stinking exhalations.

100. A trembling comes on, &c.] The riotous and gluttonous used to bathe

VOL. II.

after supper, and in the going in, and in the bath itself, they drank large draughts of hot wine, to produce sweat. Hence Juv. sat. viii. 1. 168. thermarum calices. As also after bathing they sometimes drank very hard. See my note on Juv. ubi supr.

-Triental.] A little vessel, which was a third part of a larger, and held about a gill; this he has in his hand full of warm wine, but it is shook out of his hand by the trembling with which he is seized.

101. His uncovered teeth, &c.] His face being convulsed, the lips are drawn asunder, and discover his teeth, which grind or gnash-this is frequent in convulsion-fits.

102. Greasy soups, &c.] Pulmentărium, chopped meat, with pottage or broth-AINSW. which undigested meat, vomited up, resembles. He was seized with a violent vomiting, and brought up all the dainties which he had filled his stomach with before he went into the bath.

-From his loose lips.] Hippocrat. in Prognostic. says, that, when the lips appear loose and hanging down, it is a deadly sign.

103. Hence the trumpet.] Of this intemperance he dies. The funerals of the rich were attended with trumpets. 2 M

105

110

115

and lights-the poor had only tibiæ, small pipes which played on the occa

sion.

103. This happy fellow.] Beatulus-dim. from beatus, happy. Iron.

103, 4. On an high bed, &c.] Laid on an high bier. Compositus here seems to express what we mean by laying out a

corpse.

104. Daubed over, &c.] After washing the corpse with water, they anointed it with perfumed ointment, of which the amomum, an aromatic shrub, which grew in Armenia, furnished the chief ingredient. The amomum was used in embalming. Hence momy or mummy. See AINSW.

105. His rigid heels, &c.] The Romans always carried the dead heels foremost, noting thereby their last and final departure from their house. Rigid-i. e. stiff with death.

106. Hesternal Romans.] See Juv. sat. iii. 60, note. When a person of consequence died, all the slaves which he had made free in his life-time attended the funeral; some bore the corpse, (subiere-put themselves under the bier,) others walked in procession. These, being freedmen, were reckoned among the Roman citizens; but they were looked on in a mean light, and were contemptuously called hesterni, Romans of yesterday-i. e. citizens whose dignity was of very short standing. Thus the first gentleman or nobleman of his family was called novus homo. So we, in contradistinction to families which are old, and have been long dignified, say, of some family lately

ennobled, that it is a family of yesterday.

106. Cover'd head.] Wearing the pileus, or cap, which was the signal of liberty. Servum ad pileum vocare, signified to give a slave his liberty, which they did, among the Romans, by first shaving his head, and then putting a cap upon it. AINSW.

107. "Touch, wretch, my veins."] It is very evident, from the four last lines, that the case, which the philosopher has put, is to be taken in an allegorical sense; and that, by the conduct of the wretched libertine, who rejected his physician's advice, and proceeded in his absurd courses, till he fixed a disorder upon him which brought him to the grave, he meant to represent the conduct of those who despised the philosophers, those physicians of the mind, and set at nought the precepts which they taught, till, by a continuance in their vices, their case became desperate, and ended in their destruction.

However, the opponent is supposed to understand what the philosopher said, in his story of the libertine, in a mere literal and gross sense, and is therefore represented as saying, "What's "all this to the purpose? What is this "to me? I am not sick-I don't want "a physician-try, feel my pulse."

"On my breast."] To feel the regular pulsation of my heart. 108." Nothing is hot here."] There's no sign of any feverish heat.

"Touch the extremes," &c.] You'll find there the natural heat; no coldness as in the feet and hands of a dying man.

105

"breast:

66

110

66

109. "If haply money be seen."] Here the philosopher explains himself, and seems to say, "I grant that your bodily health is good, but how is your mind? does not this labour under the diseases of covetousness, fleshly lust, intemperance, fear, and anger? As a proof of this, let me ask you, if a large sum of money comes in view, or your neighbour's handsome daughter should smile upon you, does your heart move calmly as it ought, do you feel no desire of possessing either?"

111.There is placed," &c.] What think you of a vile dish of hard, halfboiled cabbage, or coleworts, and coarse bread, such as the common people eat. Farina is lit. meal or flour; here, by meton. the bread itself which is made of it. Shaken through the sieve of the people-i. e. of the poorer sort, who used coarse sieves, which let more of the bran and husks through, and therefore their bread was coarser than that of the gentry.

113. Try your jaws.] Whether they can devour such coarse fare, or whether you would not find yourself as unable to chew, or swallow it, as if you had a sore and putrid ulcer lurking in your mouth, too tender for such coarse food, and which it would not be at all fitting

to injure, by scratching or rubbing against it with vulgar food.

114. Beet.] Beta-some sort of hard, coarse, and unsavoury herb. AINSW. Put here, by meton. for any kind of ordinary harsh food.

If you found this to be the case, you may be certain that you have a luxurious appetite.

115. When white fear, &c.] You said that you had no cold in the extremes of your feet and hands-but how is it with you when you shudder with fear?-The Stoics were great advocates for apathy, or freedom from all passions, fear among the rest. White fear, so called from the paleness of countenance that attends it.

115. Rous'd the bristles.] Arista signifies an ear of corn, or the beard of corn. Sometimes, by catachresis, an hair or bristle, which is often said to stand an end when people are in a fright.

116. Now with a torch, &c.] He now charges him with the disease of violent anger, the blood set on fire, as if a burning torch were applied, and eyes sparkling and flashing fire as it were.-In this situation, says he, you say and do things, that even Orestes himself, mad as he was, would swear were the words and

He killed Pyrrhus, the son of Achilles, in the temple of Apollo, for marrying Hermione, who had been promised to him by her father Menelaus. Apollo sent furies to haunt him for the profanation of his temple, and forced him to expiate his crimes at the altar of Diana Taurica. See Juv. sat. xv. 1. 116—19.

See HoR. sat. iii. lib. ii. 1. 133, et seq. in which satire Horace, with a degree of humour and raillery peculiar to himself, exposes the doctrine of the Stoic philosophers, which was, that all mankind were madmen and fools, except those of their own sect; this he, with

infinite humour and address, turns upon themselves, and naturally concludes, upon their own premises, that they were greater fools than the rest of the world.

The Stoics were a proud, harsh, severe, and sour sect, in many particulars not very different from the Cynics. The reader may find an instructive account of their principles, doctrines, and practices, as well as an edifying use made of them, in that masterly performance of Dr. Leland, entitled, "The Advantage "and Necessity of the Christian Reve"lation," vol. ii. p. 140-223.