Bucolica dedit, uti patet ex ultimo illo, Extremum hunc, Arethusa, mihi concede laborem: ita Naso Amorum et Tristium et Ponticorum libros, ipso teste: ita Statius Silvas suas ita Martialis Epigrammata, ut Præfationes eorum fidem faciunt: ita Persius Satiras; Phædrus et Avienus fabulas; Ausonius, Prudentius, Sidonius, Venantiusque sua Carmina; quod ex eorum Prologis abunde patet.

T 4. Quid quæris? Ipse quoque Horatius Libellos suos junctim editos aperte indicat; primum Carminum librum ex Prologo; secundum tertiumque ex Epilogis; Epodos ex illo xiv. Inceptos olim promissum carmen Iambos Ad umbilicum adducere; Sermonum priorem librum ex versu ultimo, I puer atque meo citus hæc subscribe LIBELLO; posteriorem ex Prologo; priorem vero Epistolarum et ex Prologo et ex Epilogo. Quartum vero Carminum, et Epistolarum secundum longo post cetera intervallo emissos esse, plenissimum est Suetonii testimonium; quod qui aut refellere aut eludere conantur, inanem operam insu

munt.

5. His jam positis; primum Horatii opus statuo Sermonum librum primum, quem triennio perfecit intra annos ætatis XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII; postea Secundum triennio itidem, annis XXXI, XXXII, XXXIII; deinde Epodos biennio, XXXIV et xxxv; tum Carminum librum primum triennio, XXXVI, XXXVII, XXXVIII; Secundum biennio, XL, XLI; Tertiumque pariter biennio, XLII, XLIII: inde Epistolarum primum biennio, XLVI, XLVII; tum Carminum lib. quartum et Sæculare triennio, XLIX, L, LI. Postremo Artem Poëticam et Epistolarum librum alterum, annis incertis. Intra hos cancellos omnium poëmatian natales esse ponendos, et ex argumentis singulorum et ex Annalium. fide constabit.

6. Inde est, quod in Sermonibus et Epodis et Carminum primo, Cæsar semper, nunquam. Augustus dicitur; quippe

qui id nomen consecutus est, anno demum Flacci xxxix; in sequentibus vero passim Augustus appellatur. Inde est, quod in Sermonibus et Epodis Juvenem se ubique indicat; et quod sola Satirarum laude inclaruisse se dicit, ut Bucolicorum tum Virgilium (Serm. 1, 10. v. 46.) nulla Lyricorum mentione facta.

¶ 7. In ceteris autem singulis procedentis ætatis gradus planissimis signis indicat: idque tibi ex hac serie jam a me demonstrata jucundum erit animadvertere; cum operibus Juvenilibus multa obscæna et flagitiosa insint; quanto annis provectior erat, tanto eum et poëtica virtute et argumentorum dignitate gravitateque meliorem castioremque semper evasisse.

8. Ceterum ubicumque viri doctissimi extra limites hic positos in adsignandis temporibus evagantur, toties illi in errores prolabuntur. Facile quidem mihi foret id in singulis ostendere; verum unum modo alterumve hie attingam, cetera tuæ industriæ relinquens. Libri 1. Carmen 21, Dianam teneræ dicite Virgines, perperam Sæculare vocant, et ad Horatii annum XLIX. referunt; ringente Suetonio, qui tres Carminum libros longo intervallo eum annum præcessisse testatur. Atqui nihil quicquam hic de Sæcularibus ludis proditur; sed aut ad Dianæ aut Apollinis festum spectat, quorum illud mense Augusto, hoc Julio singulis annis celebrabatur. Eodem pertinet Catulli carmen xxxv, Dianæ sumus in fide; quod Sæculare etiam a viris doctis pessime inscribitur; cum nihil ibi de Sæculo habeatur, isque diu diem obierit ante Ludos Augusti Sæculares.

9. Tum et 11, 17, Ad Macenatem ægrotum, immani parachronismo ad Horatii annum Lv. ultra libri quarti tempora ablegant; idque levi et futili argumento, quod eo anno continua insomnia vexari cœperit Mæcenas triennio ante diem fatalem. Quasi vero non plus semel in tam longa vita ægrotaverit, quem Plinius major VII, 51. perpetua febre ab adolescentia laborasse tradidit.

10. Illud vero in Sermone vi, libri 2, Quid, militibus promissa Triquetra, Prædia Cæsar, an est Itala tellure daturus? non, ut volunt, ad pugnam Actiacam annumque Flacci xxxv. referendum erat, nec ad Philippensem annumve XXIV: quippe de agrorum divisione hic agitur, quæ post Siculam de Pompeio victoriam et Lepidi deditionem in Campania alibique facta est, anno Flacci xxxI, ut disertis verbis narrat Dio p. 456, 457. Plutarchus Antonio p. 941, Paterculus 11, 81; et Appianus p. 1176. Alia omnia pari facilitate refutari possent; sed his fruere et vale.

In all this extract, confessedly, we have little more than the result of Bentley's investigations: the regular process throughout, by which facts and arguments were drawn up into a chronological system, we do not possess. Much less can we venture to say how far the internal evidence on which he so acutely proceeded in demonstrating the dates, turned entirely on facts of a public, or partly on those of a private, nature also. Still, however, one thing to me seems quite undeniable: the system of Bentley remains to this day unshaken from any quarter by legitimate confutation, unassailed indeed by any regular and systematical attempt to confute it. Whatever in the course of much reading I have hitherto seen, whether totally adverse or in part only contrary, I have found to involve such gross neglect of unquestionable truth, such absurdity springing up in immediate consequences; that seldom has more than one effort of thought been necessary to penetrate and discard it.

To the several labours however learned and plausible of Faber, of Dacier, and of Masson, after the decisive judgement of Bentley so declared (¶ 2.), it will not be expected, that any particular attention should be devoted by me. And yet, just as if Masson's accuracy in the Vita Horatii (1708) had never been disputed, (though he was held

by Dacier in great contempt,) that work has been quoted with much deference by later editors; and more or less formed on the basis of Masson's Vita or of the Chronologia per Consules of Dacier have been those compilations under the title of Q. Horatii Flacci Vita per annos digesta, which have even recently appeared.

Amongst the very latest of those who have merely gone in the old path so long trod before them, let not Mitscherlich, the German editor of the Odes, be overlooked. He wholly rejects the scheme of Bentley, and in his Preface, p. xxi. after daring to pronounce...infirma omnino Bentleii temporum ratio...he brings forward an objection founded on an allusion to the Cantabri. 3 C. viii. 21. Whoever will turn to the Fasti of Mr. Clinton, B. c. 23. p. 237, may see how the objection is answered and the credit of Bentley maintained by a touch of the pen from that unrivalled chronologist.

I embrace the occasion here offered, to acknowledge the great faithfulness and talent so conspicuous in the recent biography of Bentley; and on the general question before us, I adopt with much gratification the judgment (perfectly coincident with my own) which the biographer so strongly and comprehensively delivers.

"Bentley's scheme of the Tempora Horatiana is condemned by Mitscherlich, the Leipsic editor: but he is a person of little or no authority; and in this case he appeals to the life of Horace, by Jani, an abridgement of Masson's, one of those productions to correct the errors of which, Bentley's theory was composed."-Dr. Monk's Life of Bentley, p. 245, 8vo. —475.

But whatever excuse I may thus plead for leaving the now obsolete merits of Messrs. Faber, Dacier and Masson under "the balance and the rod" in Bentley's hands;

some distinct notice is unquestionably due to the subsequent name of Monsieur Sanadon, from its being so eminent in the criticism of Horace for right or for wrong.

In the year 1728, from the press of Claude Robustel, à Paris, there came forth in two handsome quarto volumes primâ specie a very splendid work: Les Poésies d'Horace disposées suivant l'ordre chronologique et traduites en François avec des Remarques et des Dissertations critiques. Par le R. P. Sanadon, de la Compagnie de Jesus.

The object of Mr. Sanadon avowedly embraces a very bold and radical change. He does not restore (according to the plan in this volume proposed) the Opera Horatiana to that order of books in which it is highly probable at least that they were first published by the poet himself. He revolutionises every thing; and exults in the magnificent mischief. "De toutes les piéces d'Horace je n'en laisse que trois dans leur ancienne situation." p. vi.

Now I am duly aware that the celebrated D'Orville (in the year 1750) left on record the severest condemnation of this barbarous concern. "Sanadon," he says, "qui nuper Horatium temerario ausu Absyrti instar concidit truncavitque, et triviali commentario obruit." D'Orville ad Chariton, p. 239. ed. Beck.

Klotzius too, in his Lectiones Venusina (1770), speaks of Sanadon's conceitedness at once and servile plagiarism in a strong tone of bitterness. Take the following examples: "Sanadonius interpretatur mire, et explicat defenditque versionem perperam, ut fere semper, quoties aliorum animadversiones non compilavit." p. 321.-" Sanadonio, servilis ingenii homine, cuique nihil magis succedit, quam si Bentleium aliosque compilat." p. 406.

To these severe expressions most probably Dr. Parr refers in the very clever and very playful Letter to Mr. Henry Homer on his projected variorum Edition of Horace. After calling him "a great coxcomb" in one part of it, he