APPENDIX VI

SHORT LIVES OF ROMAN AUTHORS

DECIMUS MAGNUS AUSONIUS, 309-392 A.D.

1. Life.

AUSONIUS.

Born at Burdigala (Bordeaux), and carefully educated. At the age of thirty appointed professor of rhetoric in his native University, where he became so famous that he was appointed tutor to Gratian, son of the Emperor Valentinian (364-375 A.D.), and was afterwards raised to the highest honours of the State (Consul, 379 A.D.). Theodosius (Emperor of the East, 378-395 A.D.) gave him leave to retire from court to his native country, where he closed his days in an honoured literary retirement.

2. Works.

A very voluminous writer both in prose and verse.

1. Prose: The only extant specimen is his Gratiarum Actio to Gratianus for the Consulship.

2. Verse: Of this we have much: it has little value as poetry, but in point of contents and diction it is interesting and valuable. Some of his Epigrammata and Epitaphia are worth preserving, but his claim to rank as a poet rests on his Mosella, a beautiful description of the R. Moselle, which is worthy to be compared with Pliny’s description of the R. Clitumnus (Ep. viii. 8).

‘In virtue of this poem Ausonius ranks not merely as the last, or all but the last, of Latin, but as the first of French poets.’—Mackail.

GAIUS JULIUS CAESAR, 102 (or 100?)-44 B.C.

1. Important Events in Caesar’s Life.

CAESAR.

B.C. 102. Gaius Julius Caesar, nephew of Marius, born July 12th.

  „  83. Marries Cornelia, daughter of Cinna, the friend of Marius.

2. Works.

(1) THE DE BELLO GALLICO.—This work describes Caesar’s operations in Gaul, Germany, and Britain during the years 58-52 B.C., the events of each year occupying a separate Book.

Book	I.	B.C. 58.	The Helvetii and Ariovistus the German defeated.
„	II.	„  57.	The Nervii, the bravest Belgian tribe, almost exterminated.
„	III.	„  56.	Conquest of the coast tribes of Brittany (Veneti, &c.) and of the South-West (Aquitani).
„	IV.	„  55.	Inroad of Germans into Northern Gaul repulsed. Caesar crosses the Rhine a first time. First invasion of Britain.
„	V.	„  54.	Second invasion of Britain. Fresh risings of the Gauls put down by Labienus and Q. Cicero.
„	VI.	„  53.	Caesar crosses the Rhine a second time. Northern Gaul reduced to peace.
„	VII.	„  52.	Uprising of the Gauls under Vercingetorix. Siege and capture of Alesia. Surrender of Vercingetorix. He is taken in chains to Rome, to adorn Caesar’s triumph.
„	VIII.	„  51	(added by Hirtius). Final subjugation of Gaul.

Caesar’s object was threefold:—

(2) DE BELLO CIVILI.—This work, in three Books, is similar in plan to the De Bello Gallico. It describes the events of the Civil War during the years 49-48 B.C. Book III. ends abruptly with the words:

Haec initia belli Alexandrini fuerunt.

Book	I.	B.C. 49.	Caesar crosses the Rubicon. Follows Pompeius to Brundusium and conquers Afranius in Spain.
„	II.	„  49.	Caesar takes Massilia. Submission of Varro in Further Spain. Defeat and death of Curio before Utica.
„	III.	„  48.	Caesar follows Pompeius into Illyria. The lines of Dyrrachium and the Battle of Pharsalus. The beginning of the Alexandrine War.

(3) OTHER WORKS.—All Caesar’s other writings (Speeches, Poems, &c.) have been lost, with the exception of a few brief Letters to Cicero.

3. Style.

Remarkable for brevity, directness, and simplicity. The simplest facts told in the simplest way. Ars est celare artem.

‘Caesar’s Commentaries are worthy of all praise; they are unadorned, straightforward, and elegant, every ornament being stripped off as if it were a garment.’—Cicero.

MARCUS PORCIUS CATO, 234-149 B.C.

1. Life.

CATO.

For his military and political career, his Consulship (195 B.C.), his famous Censorship (184 B.C.), and his social reforms, see some good history, e.g. Mommsen, vol, iii.

2. Works.

His chief works are:—

(1) His treatise De Re Rustica or De Agri Cultura (his only extant work).—A series of terse and pointed directions following one on another, somewhat in the manner of Hesiod, and interesting ‘as showing the practical Latin style, and as giving the prose groundwork of Vergil’s stately and beautiful embroidery in the Georgics.’—Mackail.

(2) The Origines.—‘The oldest historical work written in Latin, and the first important prose work in Roman literature.’—Mommsen. Nepos, Cato, 3, summarises the contents of the seven books.

Cato struggled all his life against Greek influence in literature and in manners, which he felt would be fatal to his ideal of a Roman citizen. In a letter to his son Marcus he says Quandoque ista gens suas litteras dabit, omnia corrumpet. He was famous for his homely wisdom, which gained him the title of Sapiens, e.g. Rem tene: verba sequentur—‘Take care of the sense: the words will take care of themselves.’

GAIUS VALERIUS CATULLUS, circ. 84-54 B.C.

1. Life.

CATULLUS.

Born at Verona, of a family of wealth and position, as is seen from his having estates at Sirmio:—

Salve, O venusta Sirmio, atque ero gaude (C. 31)

and near Tibur: O funde noster seu Sabine seu Tiburs (C. 44). His father was an intimate friend of Caesar. He went to Rome early, where he spent the greater part of his short life,

with the exception of an official journey to Bithynia, 57 B.C. to better his fortunes: cf. Iam ver egelidos refert tepores ... Linquantur Phrygii, Catulle, campi (C. 46). After a life of poetic culture and free social enjoyment he died at the early age of thirty, ‘the young Catullus,’ hedera iuvenilia tempora cinctus (Ovid, Am. III. ix. 61).

2. Works.

116 poems written in various metres and on various subjects, Lyric, Elegiac, Epic.

‘The event which first revealed the full power of his genius, and which made both the supreme happiness and supreme misery of his life, was his love for Lesbia (Clodia).’—Sellar.

‘Catullus is one of the great poets of the world, not so much through vividness of imagination as through his singleness of nature, his vivid impressibility, and his keen perception. He received the gifts of the passing hour so happily that to produce pure and lasting poetry it was enough for him to utter in natural words something of the fulness of his heart. He says on every occasion exactly what he wanted to say, in clear, forcible, spontaneous language.’—Sellar.

‘The most attractive feature in the character of Catullus is the warmth of his affection. If to love warmly, constantly, and unselfishly be the best title to the love of others, few poets in any age or country deserve a kindlier place in the hearts of men than “the young Catullus.”’—Sellar.

MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO, 106-43 B.C.

1. Important Events in Cicero’s Life, and chief Works.

CICERO.

B.C. 106. Born at Arpinum. Birth of Pompeius.

  „ 102. Birth of Quintus Cicero, and of Caesar.

2. Works.

(1) Speeches.—We possess 57 speeches, and fragments of about 20 more, and we know of 33 others delivered by Cicero.

‘As a speaker and orator Cicero succeeded in gaining a place beside Demosthenes. His strongest point is his style; there he is clear, concise and apt, perspicuous, elegant and brilliant. He commands all moods, from playful jest to tragic pathos, but is most successful in the imitation of conviction and feeling, to which he gave increased impression by his fiery delivery.’—Teuffel. Quintilian says of him that his eloquence combined the power of Demosthenes, the copiousness of Plato, and the sweetness of Isocrates.

(2) Philosophical Works.—The chief are the De Republica (closed by the Sommium Sciponis): the De Legibus: the De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum: the Academics: Tusculan Disputations with the De Divinatione: the De Senectute and De Amicitia: De natura Deorum, and the De Officiis.

As a philosopher Cicero had no pretensions to originality. He found the materials for most of these works in the writings of the Greek philosophers. ‘I have to supply little but the words,’ he writes, ‘and for these I am never at a loss.’ It was however no small achievement to mould the Latin tongue to be a vehicle for Greek philosophic thought, and thus to render the conclusions of Greek thinkers accessible to his own countrymen.

(3) Rhetorical treatises.—The chief are the De Oratore (in 3 Books), perhaps the most finished example of the Ciceronian style: the Brutus or De Claris Oratoribus, and the Orator (or De optime Genere Dicendi).

(4) Letters.—Besides 774 letters written by Cicero, we have 90 addressed to him by friends. The two largest collections of his Letters are the Epistulae ad Atticum (68-43 B.C.) and the Epistulae ad Familiares (62-43 B.C.).

These letters are of supreme importance for the history of Cicero’s time. ‘The quality which makes them most valuable is that they were not (like the letters of Pliny, and Seneca, and Madame de Sévigné) written to be published. We see in them Cicero as he was. We behold him in his strength and in his weakness—the bold advocate, and yet timid and vacillating statesman, the fond husband, the affectionate father, the kind master, the warm-hearted friend.’—Tyrrell.

The style of the Letters is colloquial but thoroughly accurate. ‘The art of letter-writing suddenly rose in Cicero’s hands to its full perfection.’—Mackail.

(5) Poems.—The fragments we possess show that verse-writing came easily to him, but he never could have been a great poet, for he had not the divinus afflatus, so finely expressed by Ovid in the line Est Deus in nobis, agitante calescimus illo.

‘Cicero stands in prose like Vergil in poetry, as the bridge between the ancient and the modern world. Before his time Latin prose was, from a wide point of view, but one among many local ancient dialects. As it left his hands it had become a universal language, one which had definitely superseded all others, Greek included, as the type of civilised expression.’—Mackail.

CLAUDIUS CLAUDIANUS, flor. 400 A.D.

1. Life.

CLAUDIAN.

Born probably at Alexandria, where he lived until, in the year of the death of Theodosius 395 A.D., he acquired the patronage of Stilicho, the great Vandal general, who, as guardian of the young Emperor Honorius, was practically ruler of the Western Empire. He remained attached to the Court at Milan, Rome and Ravenna, and died soon after the downfall of his patron Stilicho, 408 A.D.

2. Works.

In his historical epics he derived his subjects from his own age, praising his patrons Stilicho (On the Consulate of Stilicho) and Honorius (on the Consulate of Honorius), and inveighing against Rufinus and Eutropius, the rivals of Stilicho. Of poems on other subjects, ‘his three books of the unfinished Rape of Proserpine are among the finest examples of the purely literary epic.’—Mackail.

‘Claudian is the last of the Latin poets, forming the transitional link between the Classic and the Gothic mode of thought.’—Coleridge.

3. Style.

‘His faults belong almost as much to the age as to the writer. In description he is too copious and detailed: his poems abound with long speeches: his parade of varied learning, his partiality for abstruse mythology, are just the natural defects of a lettered but uninspired epoch.’—North Pinder.

QUINTUS ENNIUS, 239-169 B.C.

1. Life.

ENNIUS.

He was born at Rudiae in Calabria (about 19 miles S. of Brundisium), a meeting-place of three different languages, that of common life (Oscan, cf. Opici), that of culture and education (Greek), that of military service (Latin). Here he lived for some twenty years, availing himself of those means of education which at this time were denied to Rome or Latium. We next hear of him serving as centurion in Sardinia, where he attracted the attention of Cato, then quaestor, and accompanied him to Rome, 204 B.C. Here for some fifteen years he lived plainly, supporting himself by teaching Greek, and making translations of Greek plays for the Roman stage, and so won the friendship of the elder Scipio. In 189 B.C. M. Fulvius Nobilior took Ennius with him in his campaign against the Aetolians, as a witness and herald of his deeds. His son obtained for Ennius the Roman citizenship (184 B.C.) by giving him a grant of land at Potentia in Picenum. Nos sumus Romani, qui fuimus ante Rudini. The rest of his life was spent mainly at Rome in cheerful simplicity and active literary work.

2. Works.

The chief are:—

(1) Tragedies.—Mainly translations, especially from Euripides. A few fragments only remain. ‘It was certainly due to Ennius that Roman Tragedy was first raised to that pitch of popular favour which it enjoyed till the age of Cicero.’—Sellar.

(2) Annales.—An Epic Hexameter poem, in 18 books, which dealt with the History of Rome from the landing of Aeneas in Italy down to the Third Macedonian War (Pydna, 168 B.C.). About 600 lines are extant.

‘In his Annals he unfolds a long gallery of national portraits. His heroes are men of one common aim—the advancement of Rome; animated with one sentiment, devotion to the State. All that was purely personal in them seems merged in the traditional pictures which express only the fortitude, dignity and sagacity of the Republic.’—Sellar.

3. Style.

For the first time Ennius succeeded in moulding the Latin language to the movement of the Greek hexameter. In spite of imperfections and roughness, his Annals remained the foremost and representative Roman poem till Vergil wrote the Aeneid. Lucretius, whom he influenced, and to whom Vergil owes so much, says of him:

‘As sang our Ennius, the first who brought down from pleasant Helicon a chaplet of unfading leaf, the fame of which should ring out clear through the nations of Italy.’

And later, Quintilian, X. i. 88: ‘Ennium sicut sacros vetustate lucos adoremus, in quibus grandia et antiqua robora iam non tantam habent speciem quantam religionem: Let us venerate Ennius like the groves, sacred from their antiquity, in which the great and ancient oak-trees are invested, not so much with beauty, as with sacred associations.’—Sellar.

FLAVIUS EUTROPIUS, fl. 375 A.D.

1. Life.

EUTROPIUS.

Very little is known of his life. He is said to have held the office of a secretary under Contanstine the Great (ob. 337 A.D.), and to have served under the Emperor Julian in his ill-fated expedition against the Persians, 363 A.D.

2. Works.

His only extant work is his

Breviarium Historiae Romanae.—A brief compendium of Roman History in ten books from the foundation of the city to the accession of Valens, 364 A.D., to whom it is inscribed.

3. Style.

His work is a compilation made from the best authorities, with good judgment and impartiality, and in a simple style. Its brevity and practical arrangement made it very popular.

FLORUS, circ. 120 (or 140?) A.D. (temp. Hadrian).

1. Life.

FLORUS.

L. Julius (or Annaeus) Florus lived at Rome in the time of Trajan or Hadrian. Little else is known of his life.

2. Works.

An Epitome of the Wars of Livy, in two Books:—

3. Style.

A pretentious and smartly written work abounding in mistakes, contradictions, and misrepresentations of historical truth. It was, however, popular in the Middle Ages on account of its brevity and its rhetorical style. Florus is useful in giving us a short account of events in periods where we have no books of Livy to guide us.

S. JULIUS FRONTINUS, circ. 41-103 A.D.

1. Life.

FRONTINUS.

He was praetor urbanus 70 A.D., and in 75 succeeded Cerealis as governor oi Britain, where, as Tacitus tells us, he distinguished himself by the conquest of the Silures: sustinuit molem Iulius Frontinus, vir magnus, quantum licebat, validamque et pugnacem Siturum gentem armis subegit: ‘Julius Frontinus was equal to the burden, a great man as far as greatness was then possible (i.e. under the jealous rule of Domitian), who subdued by his arms the powerful and warlike tribe of the Silures.’

In 97 he was nominated curator aquarum, administrator of the aqueducts of Rome: the closing years of his life were passed in studious retirement at his villa on the Bay of Naples. Cf. Mart. X. lviii.

2. Works.

Two works of his are extant:—

(1) De Aquis Urbis Romae.—A treatise on the Roman water-supply, published under Trajan, soon after the death of Nerva, 97 A.D.; a complete and valuable account.

(2) Strategemata.—A manual of strategy, in three books, consisting of historical examples derived chiefly from Sallust, Caesar, and Livy.

3. Style.

Simple and concise: ‘he shuns the conceits of the period and goes back to the republican authors, of whom (and especially of Caesar’s Commentaries) his language strongly reminds us.’—Cruttwell.

As a mark of his unaffected modesty, Pliny (Ep. ix. 19) tells us: vetuit exstrui monimentum: sed quibus verbis? ‘impensa monimenta supervacua est: memoria nostri durabit, si vita meruimus.’

AULUS GELLIUS, circ. 123-175 A.D.

1. Life.

GELLIUS.

All that is known about his life is gathered from occasional hints in his own writings. He seems to have spent his early years at Rome, studying under the most famous teachers, first at Rome and afterwards at Athens, and then to have returned to Rome, where he spent the remaining years of his life in literary pursuits and in the society of a large circle of friends.

2. Works.

The Noctes Atticae (so called because it was begun during the long nights of winter in a country house in Attica) in twenty books consists of numerous extracts from Greek and Roman writers on subjects connected with history, philosophy, philology, natural science and antiquities, illustrated by abundant criticisms and discussions. It is, in fact, a commonplace book, and the arrangement of the contents is merely casual, following the course of his reading of Greek and Latin authors. The work is, however, of special value to us from the very numerous quotations from ancient authors preserved by him alone.

3. Style.

His language is sober but full of archaisms, which he much affected (he gives, therefore, no quotations from post-Augustan writers). His style shows the defects of an age in which men had ceased to feel the full meaning of the words they used, and strove to hide the triviality of a subject under obscure phrases and florid expression. Yet, on the whole, he is a very interesting writer, and the last that can in any way be called classical.

‘Vir elegantissimi eloquii et multae ac facundae scientiae.’—St. Augustine, 400 A.D.

QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUS, 65-8 B.C.

1. Important Events in the Life of Horace.

HORACE.

B.C. 65. Born at Venusia (Venosa) on the confines of Apulia and Lucania.

B.C. 53-46. Educated at Rome under the famous plagosus Orbilius.

3. Works.

(1) Odes, in four books, and Epodes.—The words of Cicero (pro Archia 16) best describe the abiding value of the four Books of the Odes—Adolescentiam alunt (strengthen), senectutem oblectant, secundas res ornant, adversis perfugium ac solacium praebent, delectant domi, non impediunt foris, pernoctant nobiscum, peregrinantur, rusticantur. In them we see a poet, as Quintilian says, verbis felicissime audax—most happily daring in his use of words and endowed, as Petronius says, with curiosa felicitas, a subtle happiness of expression—‘what oft was thought but ne’er so well express’d.’

(2) Satires (Sermones) in two Books.—Horace’s chief model is Lucilius, whom he wished to adapt to the Augustan age. To touch on political topics was impossible; Horace employed satire to display his own individuality and his own views on various subjects. Book I (his earliest effort) is marred by faults in execution and is often wanting in good taste; but in Book II ‘he uses the hexameter to exhibit the semi-dramatic form of easy dialogue, with a perfection as complete as that of Vergil in the stately and serious manner. In reading these Satires we all read our own minds and hearts.’—Mackail.

(3) The Epistles (Sermones) in two Books, and Ars Poetica (Ep. ad Pisones).—These represent his most mature production. As a poet Horace now stood without a rival. Life was still full of vivid interest for him, but years (fallentis semita vitae) had brought the philosophic mind. ‘To teach the true end and wise regulation of life, and to act on character from within, are the motives of the more formal and elaborate epistles.’—Sellar.

The Ars Poetica is a résumé of Greek criticism on the drama.

3. Style.

‘With the principal lyric metres, the Sapphic and Alcaic, Horace had done what Vergil had accomplished with the dactylic hexameter, carried them to the highest point of which the foreign Latin tongue was capable.’—Mackail.

‘As Vergil is the most idealising exponent of what was of permanent and universal significance in the time, Horace is the most complete exponent of its actual life and movement. He is at once the lyrical poet, with heart and imagination responsive to the deeper meaning and lighter amusements of life, and the satirist, the moralist, and the literary critic of the age.’—Sellar.

JUSTINUS, circ. 150 A.D. (temp. Antoninus Pius).

1. Life.

JUSTINUS.

We know nothing positively about him, though probably he lived in the age of the Antonines. Teuffel says ‘Considering his correct mode of thinking and the style of his preface, we should not like to put him much later than Florus, who epitomised Livy.’

2. Works.

Epitoma Historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi, in forty-four Books.—An abridgment of the Universal History of Pompeius Trogus (temp. Livy). The title Historiae Philippicae was given to it by Trogus because its main object was to give the history of the Macedonian monarchy, with all its branches, but he allowed himself, like Herodotus, to indulge in such large digressions that it was regarded by many as a Universal History. It was arranged according to nations; it began with Ninus, the Nimrod of legend, and was brought down to about 9 A.D.

3. Style.

Justinus (as he tells us in his Preface) made it his business to form an attractive reading-book—breve veluti florum corpusculum feci (an anthology)—and his chief merit is that he seems to have been a faithful abbreviator.

DECIMUS JUNIUS JUVENALIS, 55-138 A.D.

1. Life.

JUVENAL.

Of Juvenal’s life very little is certainly known. Thirteen lives of him exist, which are confused and contradictory in detail. From the evidences of the Satires we learn that he lived from early youth at Rome, but went for holidays to Aquinum, a town of the Volscians (where perhaps he was born in the reign of Nero); that he had a small farm at Tibur, and a house in Rome, where he entertained his friends in a modest way; that he had been in Egypt; that he wrote Satires late in life; that he reached his eightieth year, and lived into the reign of Antoninus Pius. He complains frequently and bitterly of his poverty and of the hardships of a dependent’s life. In short, the circumstances of his life were very similar to those of Martial, who speaks of Juvenal as a very intimate friend.

The famous inscription at Aquinum—which Duff considers does not refer to the poet but to a wealthy kinsman of his—indicates that he had served in the army as commander of a Dalmatian cohort, and, as one of the chief men of the town, was superintendent of the civic worship paid to Vespasian after his deification.

All the Lives assert that Juvenal was banished to Egypt—Juvenal himself never alludes to this—for offence given to an actor who was high in favour with the reigning Emperor (Hadrian according to Prof. Hardy), and that he died in exile.

2. Works.

Saturae, sixteen, grouped in five Books.

Books I-III (Satires 1-9) are sharply divided both in form and substance from Books IV-V (Satires 10-16), which are not satires at all, but moral essays, in the form of letters. The first nine satires present a wonderfully vivid picture of the seamy side of life at Rome at the end of the first century. We must, however, read side by side with them the contemporary Letters of Pliny, in which we find ourselves in a different world from that scourged by the satirist.

‘His chief literary qualities are his power of painting lifelike scenes, and his command of brilliant epigrammatic phrase.’—Duff. Nothing, for instance, could surpass his picture of the fall of Sejanus (Sat. x. 56-97). His power of coining phrases is seen in these sententiae: nemo repente fuit turpissimus—expende Hannibalem: quot libras in duce summo | invenies: maxima debetur puero reverentia: mens sana in corpora sano—which are familiar proverbs among educated men.

Juvenal tells us that he takes all life, all the world, for his text:

(the motley subject of my page).—Sat. i. 85-6.

TITUS LIVIUS PATAVINUS, circ. 59 B.C.-17 A.D.

1. Life.

LIVY.

Livy was born at Patavium (Padua) between the years 59 and 57 B.C. Little is known of his life, but his aristocratic sympathies, as seen in his writings, seem to suggest that he was of good family. Padua was a populous and busy place, where opportunities for public speaking were abundant and the public life vigorous; thus Livy was early trained in eloquence, and lived amid scenes of human activity. About 30 B.C. he settled at Rome, where his literary talents secured the patronage and friendship of Augustus. But though a courtier he was no flatterer. ‘Titus Livius,’ says Tacitus (Ann. iv. 34), ‘pre-eminently famous for eloquence and truthfulness, extolled Cn. Pompeius in such a panegyric that Augustus called him Pompeianus, and yet this was no obstacle to their friendship.’ He returned to his native town before his death, 17 A.D., at the age of about 75.

2. Works.

History of Rome (Ab urbe condita Libri), a comprehensive account in 142 Books of the whole History of Rome from the foundation of the City to the death of Drusus, 9 A.D. It is probable that he intended to continue his work in 150 Books, down to the death of Augustus in 14 A.D., the point from which Tacitus starts. The number of Books now extant is 35, about one fourth of the whole number, but we possess summaries (Periochae or Argumenta) of nearly the whole work. The division of the History into decades (sets of ten Books), though merely conventional, is convenient. According to this arrangement the Books now extant are:

Books I-X, 754-293 B.C., to nearly the close of the Third Samnite War.

Books XXI-XXX, 219-201 B.C., the narrative of the Second Punic War.

Books XXXI-XLV, 201-167 B.C., describe the Wars in Greece and Macedonia, and end with the triumph of Aemilius Paulus after Pydna, 168 B.C.

3. Style.

His style is characterised by variety, liveliness, and picturesqueness. ‘As a master of style Livy is in the first rank of historians. He marks the highest point which the enlarged and enriched prose of the Augustan age reached just before it began to fall into decadence. . . . The periodic structure of Latin prose, which had been developed by Cicero, is carried by him to an even greater complexity and used with a greater daring and freedom. . . . His imagination never fails to kindle at great actions; it is he, more than any other author, who has impressed the great soldiers and statesmen of the Republic on the imagination of the world.’—Mackail.

4. The Speeches.

‘The spirit in which he writes History is well illustrated by the Speeches. These, in a way, set the tone of the whole work. He does not affect in them to reproduce the substance of words actually spoken, or even to imitate the colour of the time in which the speech is laid. He uses them rather as a vivid and dramatic method of portraying character and motive.’—Mackail. ‘Everything,’ says Quintilian (X. i. 101), ‘is perfectly adapted both to the circumstances and personages introduced.’

5. The Purpose of his History.

The first ten books of Livy were being written about the same time as the Aeneid; both Vergil and Livy had the same patriotic purpose, ‘to celebrate the growth, in accordance with a divine dispensation, of the Roman Empire and Roman civilisation.’—Nettleship. Livy, however, brought into greater prominence the moral causes which contributed to the growth of the Empire. In his preface to Book I, § 9, he asks his readers to consider what have been the life and habits of the Romans, by aid of what men and by what talents at home and in the field their Empire has been gained and extended. Only by virtue and manliness, justice and piety, was the dominion of the world achieved.

‘In ancient Rome he sees his ideal realised, and romanus hence signifies in his language all that is noble. He thus involuntarily appears partial to Rome, and unjust to her enemies, notably to the Samnites and Hannibal.’—Teuffel.

‘As the title of Gesta Populi Romani was given to the Aeneid on its appearance, so the Historiae ab Urbe Condita might be called, with no less truth, a funeral eulogy—consummatio totius vitae et quasi funebris laudatio (Sen. Suas. VI. 21)—delivered, by the most loving and most eloquent of her sons, over the grave of the great Republic.’—Mackail.

M. ANNAEUS LUCANUS, 39-65 A.D.

1. Life.

LUCAN.

Important Events in the Life of Lucan.

A.D. 39. Born at Corduba (Cordova) on the R. Baetis (Guadalquivir).

Lucan was a nephew of M. Annaeus Novatus (the Gallio of Acts xviii. 12-17), and of Seneca, the philosopher and tutor of Nero. ‘Rhetoric and Stoic dogma were the staple of his mental training. For a much-petted, quick-witted youth, plunged into such a society as that of Rome in the first century A.D., hardly any training could be more mischievous. Puffed up with presumed merits and the applause of the lecture-room and the salon, he became a shallow rhetorician, devoted to phrase-making and tinsel ornament, and ready to write and declaim on any subject in verse or prose at the shortest notice.’—Heitland. Silenced by Nero, in an enforced retirement—probably in the stately gardens spoken of by Juvenal vii. 79-80 contentus fama iaceat Lucanus in hortis Marmoreis—Lucan may repose in his park adorned with statues and find fame enough—he brooded over his wrongs, and despairing of any other way of restoration to public life, joined the ill-fated conspiracy of Piso.

2. Works.

The Pharsalia (or De Bello Civili), an epic poem in ten Books, from the beginning of the Civil War down to the point where Caesar is besieged in Alexandria, 49-48 B.C. His narrative thus runs parallel to Caesar’s De Bello Civili, but it contains some valuable additional matter and gives a faithful picture of the feeling general among the nobility of the day.

3. Style.

‘To Lucan’s rhetorical instincts and training, and the influence of the recitations which Juvenal Sat. iii. tells us were so customary and such a nuisance in his day, are due the great defects of the Pharsalia. We see the sacrifice of the whole to the parts, neglect of the matter in an over-studious regard for the manner, a self-conscious tone appealing rather to an audience than to a reader, venting itself in apostrophes, digressions, hyperbole (over-drawn description), episodes and epigrams, an unhappy laboriousness that strains itself to be first-rate for a moment, but leaves the poem second-rate for ever.’—Heitland.

The general effect of Lucan’s verse is one of steady monotony, due to a want of variety in the pauses and in the ending of lines, and a too sparing use of elision, by which Vergil was able to regulate the movement of lines and make sound and sense agree.

‘In spite of its immaturity and bad taste the poem compels admiration by its elevation of thought and sustained brilliance of execution; it contains passages of lofty thought and real beauty, such as the dream of Pompeius, or the character which Cato gives of Pompeius, and is full of quotations which have become household words; such as, In se magna ruunt—Stat magni nominis umbra—Nil actum reputans si quid superesset agendum (a line which rivals Caesar’s energy).’—Mackail.

The brief and balanced judgment of Quintilian (Inst. Orat. X. i. 90) sums up Lucan in words which suggest at once his chief merits and defects as a poet: Lucanus ardens et concitatus et sententiis clarissimus et magis oratoribus quam poetis imitandus—Lucan has fire and point, is very famous for his maxims, and indeed is rather a model for orators than poets.

GAIUS LUCILIUS, circ. 170-103 B.C.

1. Life.

LUCILIUS.

Lucilius was born in the Latin town of Suessa of the Aurunci, in Campania, of a well-to-do equestrian family. Velleius tells us that the sister of Lucilius was grandmother to Pompeius, and that Lucilius served in the cavalry under Scipio in the Numantine war, 134 B.C. Lucilius lived on very intimate terms with Scipio Africanus Minor and Laelius, and died at Naples (103 B.C.), where he was honoured with a public funeral.

2. Works.

Saturae in thirty Books, in various metres. Fragments only are extant.

‘After Terence he is the most distinguished and the most important in his literary influence among the friends of Scipio. The form of literature which he invented and popularised, that of familiar poetry, was one which proved singularly suited to the Latin genius. He speaks of his own works under the name of Sermones (talks)—a name which was retained by his great successor and imitator Horace; but the peculiar combination of metrical form with wide range of subject and the pedestrian style of ordinary prose received in popular usage the name Satura (mixture).’—Mackail.

Satura quidem tota nostra est, in qua primus insignem laudem adeptus Lucilius.—Quint. X. i. 93.

‘The chief social vices which Lucilius attacks are those which reappear in the pages of the later satirists. They are the two extremes to which the Roman temperament was most prone: rapacity and meanness in gaining money, vulgar ostentation and coarse sensuality in using it.’—Sellar.

Juvenal says of him (Sat. i. 165-7):

‘When old Lucilius seems to draw his sword and growls in burning ire, the hearer blushes for shame, his conscience is chilled for his offences, and his heart faints for secret sins.’

T. LUCRETIUS CARUS, circ. 99-55 B.C.

1. Life.

LUCRETIUS.

Very little is known of his life. The subiect of his poem prevented him from telling his own history as Catullus, Horace, and Ovid have done, and his contemporaries seldom refer to him. The name Lucretius suggests that he was descended from one of the most ancient patrician houses of Rome, famous in the early annals of the Republic. He was evidently a man of wealth and position, but he deliberately chose the life of contemplation, and lived apart from the ambitions and follies of his day. Donatus, in his life of Vergil, tells us that Lucretius died on the day on which Vergil assumed the toga virilis, Oct. 15, 55 B.C.

2. Works.

The De Rerum Natura, a didactic poem in hexameter verse in six Books. The poem was left unfinished at his death, and Munro supports the tradition that Cicero both corrected it and superintended its publication. The object of the poem is to deliver men from the fear of death and the terrors of superstition by the new knowledge of Nature: