HORACE BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH WHAT Virgil did for epic poetry, Horace did for lyric. Disregarding everything that Roman precursors in the same field had attempted, he looked to Greek poetry for his models. He even went so far as to speak slightingly of Catullus, whose lyrical gift far surpassed his own. His position in literature is unique. Without any very special inspiration, intensity of feeling, or profundity of thought, he produced a body of verse that not only succeeded in winning the interest of his own generation, but has held the attention of all subsequent ages. The real basis of this success is probably the character of the man, with his wide human sympathy, his practical wisdom and knowledge of the world, and his fund of humor and good fellowship, qualities which find their expression through a medium to which felicity of phrase, unusual skill in handling metrical forms, and the fine sense of appropriateness in figure, word, and theme, which is an attribute of the artist only, give a rare distinction. He was a freedman's son, born at Venusia, a town on the confines of Apulia, in 65 B. C. Of his education at Rome, which he owed to his father's foresight and self-sacrifice, he himself tells us something in his Satires. Centurions and the like --- were wont to swarm, With slate and satchel on sinister arm, And the poor dole of scanty pence to pay The starveling teacher monthly to the day; There to be taught all arts, that grace the home He afterwards went to Athens to continue his studies, and he was there at the time of the assassination of Caesar. His sympathies at this period of his life seem to have been strongly Republican, for he joined the forces of Brutus and Cassius, and fought as a military tribune at Philippi. The seventh ode of the second book has a humorous reference to his experience as a soldier. When the war was over he was pardoned, and returned to Rome, where he became one of that coterie of literary men which was known as the Maecenas circle, enjoying the patronage of Augustus' prime minister, and of Augustus himself. Here or at his villa in the Sabine country, which he owed to the generosity of Maecenas, he spent his life, perfectly content with a modest competence and the fame which his writings won him. His works consist of four books of Odes, the Carmen Saeculare, composed for the celebration of the Secular Games under Augustus, a number of Epodes, two books of Satires, and two books of Epistles. The collection of Odes shows a great variety of subjects. Some of them are love poems written in the mock serious tone which is peculiarly Horatian: for example, the thirteenth of the first book, addressed to Lydia, the sixteenth, to Tyndaris, the nineteenth, to Glycera, the twenty-third, to Chloe, the eighth of the second book, to Barine, the tenth of the third, to Lyce. The length of the list will serve to show that our poet's affections had a wider range than is altogether consistent with even a moderate standard of constancy. A much more serious vein appears in the odes devoted to questions of politics and morals, as the fourteenth of the first book, To the Ship of State, and the noble series at the beginning of the third book. Another class consists of those in which we see the poet in relation to his friends. As examples may be cited from the first book the third, in which he gives Godspeed to the ship on which Virgil sailed for Greece, the twentieth, an invitation to Maecenas to visit him at his Sabine farm, and the twenty-ninth, in which he rallies Iccius on his military ambition. The Odes are arranged within the different books with regard to variety of theme and metre. In the Epodes, which stand first, in order of composition, of all the poet's works, and which are written in the iambic metre, there is a strong element of invective, several of them being directed against individuals who in one way or another had aroused the poet's ire, e. g., the parvenu whose ambition was to attract attention on the Sacra Via by his elaborate dress (IV.), the alleged sorceress Canidia (V.), and the writer who made better men than himself the objects of his libellous attacks (VI.). The tone of the Satires is much more moderate. These are in hexameters, and are delightful sketches of different phases of Roman literary and social conditions. Among the most famous is the fifth of the first book, which describes the various incidents of a journey from Rome to Brundisium which Horace took with Maecenas, Virgil, and other well-known men. The ninth of the same book is a delightfully humorous account of Horace's encounter with a bore on the Sacra Via. The tenth deals with literary subjects. In the second book the sixth contrasts life in the country and life in the town, the eighth gives a picture of a parvenu's dinner party. In the first book of the Epistles we have perhaps the poet's best work. Some of the themes are not unlike those treated in the Satires, but the style, informal and easy as ever, has a still subtler charm that comes from greater maturity. The second book is confined to literary topics, the third epistle being the famous Art of Poetry, Horace's most pretentious essay in the field of literary criticism. TO LYDIA (Odes, I., 8.) WHY, Lydia, why, I pray, by all the gods above, Art so resolved that Sybaris should die, And all for love? Why doth he shun 1 The Campus Martius' 1 sultry glare? He that once recked of neither dust nor sun, As 't were from viper's tongue distilled? He, once so skilled, The disc or dart Far, far beyond the mark to hurl, And tell me, tell me, in what nook apart, Like baby-girl, Lurks the poor boy, Veiling his manhood, as did Thetis' son,2 15 20 To 'scape war's bloody clang, while fated Troy Was yet undone ? SIR THEODORE MARTIN. 1 The plain by the Tiber, where the Roman youth exercised. 2 Achilles, who was disguised as a girl by his mother to prevent his being taken to the Trojan war. WINTER (Odes, I., 9.) SEE, Thaliarch, see, across the plain Scarce may the laboring woods sustain Logs on the fire, your biggest, fling, And from the time to take its sting Four mellowing summers old. All else unto the Gods leave we; When they have stilled the roar Of winds that with the yeasty sea Conflict and brawl, the cypress-tree, The old ash shake no more. What with to-morrow comes forbear Each day fate grants, ere time and care ; Nor, boy, disdain the dance! For, mark, Now is thy time to take Joy in the play, the crowded park, Which trysting lovers make. 1 Mt. Soracte, about twenty-five miles north of Rome. 10 15 20 25 |