The works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 14

NOTES

ON

ÆNEÏS, BOOK VI.

Note I.

This was taken, amongst many other things, from the tenth book of Plato de Republicâ: no commentator, besides Fabrini, has taken notice of it. Self-murder was accounted a great crime by that divine philosopher; but the instances which he brings are too many to be inserted in these short notes. Sir Robert Howard, in his translation of this Æneïd, which was printed with his poems in the year 1660, has given us the most learned and the most judicious observations on this book, which are extant in our language.

Note II.

These two verses in English seem very different from the Latin—

Yet they are the sense of Virgil; at least, according to the common interpretation of this place—"I will withdraw from your company, retire to the shades, and perform my penance of a thousand years." But I must confess, the interpretation of those two words, explebo numerum, is somewhat violent, if it be thus understood, minuam numerum; that is, I will lessen your company by my departure: for Deïphobus, being a ghost, can hardly be said to be of their number. Perhaps the poet means by explebo numerum, absolvam sententiam; as if Deïphobus replied to the Sibyl, who was angry at his long visit, "I will only take my last leave of Æneas, my kinsman and my friend, with one hearty good wish for his health and welfare, and then leave you to prosecute your voyage." That wish is expressed in the words immediately following, I, decus, i, nostrum, &c. which contain a direct answer to what the Sibyl said before, when she upbraided their long discourse, nos flendo ducimus horas. This conjecture is new, and therefore left to the discretion of the reader.

Note III.

Here the sun is not expressed, but the moon only, though a less, and also a less radiant, light. Perhaps the copies of Virgil are all false, and that, instead of Titaniaque astra, he writ, Titaniaque, et astra; and according to these words I have made my translation. It is most certain, that the sun ought not to be omitted; for he is frequently called the life and soul of the world: and nothing bids so fair for a visible divinity to those who know no better, than that glorious luminary. The Platonists call God the archetypal sun, and the sun the visible deity, the inward vital spirit in the centre of the universe, or that body to which that spirit is united, and by which it exerts itself most powerfully. Now it was the received hypothesis amongst the Pythagoreans, that the sun was situate in the centre of the world. Plato had it from them, and was himself of the same opinion, as appears by a passage in the Timæus; from which noble dialogue is this part of Virgil's poem taken.

Note IV.

There is no question but Virgil here means Cato Major, or the censor. But the name of Cato being also mentioned in the Eighth Æneïd, I doubt whether he means the same man in both places. I have said in the preface, that our poet was of republican principles; and have given this for one reason of my opinion, that he praised Cato in that line,

and accordingly placed him in the Elysian fields. Montaigne thinks this was Cato the Utican, the great enemy of arbitrary power, and a professed foe to Julius Cæsar. Ruæus would persuade us that Virgil meant the censor. But why should the poet name Cato twice, if he intended the same person? Our author is too frugal of his words and sense, to commit tautologies in either. His memory was not likely to betray him into such an error. Nevertheless I continue in the same opinion concerning the principles of our poet. He declares them sufficiently in this book, where he praises the first Brutus for expelling the Tarquins, giving liberty to Rome, and putting to death his own children, who conspired to restore tyranny. He calls him only an unhappy man, for being forced to that severe action—

Let the reader weigh these two verses, and he must be convinced that I am in the right, and that I have not much injured my master in my translation of them.

Note V.

This note, which is out of its proper place, I deferred on purpose, to place it here, because it discovers the principles of our poet more plainly than any of the rest.

Anchises here speaks to Julius Cæsar, and commands him first to lay down his arms; which is a plain condemnation of his cause. Yet observe our poet's incomparable address; for, though he shews himself sufficiently to be a commonwealth's man, yet, in respect to Augustus, who was his patron, he uses the authority of a parent, in the person of Anchises, who had more right to lay this injunction on Cæsar than on Pompey, because the latter was not of his blood. Thus our author cautiously veils his own opinion, and takes sanctuary under Anchises; as if that ghost would have laid the same command on Pompey also, had he been lineally descended from him. What could be more judiciously contrived, when this was the Æneïd which he chose to read before his master?

Note VI.

In Virgil thus:

How unpoetically and badly had this been translated, Thou shalt Marcellus be! Yet some of my friends were of opinion, that I mistook the sense of Virgil in my translation. The French interpreter observes nothing on this place, but that it appears by it, the mourning of Octavia was yet fresh for the loss of her son Marcellus, whom she had by her first husband, and who died in the year ab urbe conditâ, 731; and collects from thence, that Virgil, reading this Æneïd before her in the same year, had just finished it; that, from this time to that of the poet's death, was little more than four years; so that, supposing him to have written the whole Æneïs in eleven years, the first six books must have taken up seven of those years; on which account, the six last must of necessity be less correct.

Now, for the false judgment of my friends, there is but this little to be said for them; the words of Virgil, in the verse preceding, are these,

as if the poet had meant, "if you break through your hard destiny, so as to be born, you shall be called Marcellus:" but this cannot be the sense; for, though Marcellus was born, yet he broke not through those hard decrees, which doomed him to so immature a death. Much less can Virgil mean, "you shall be the same Marcellus by the transmigration of his soul:" for, according to the system of our author, a thousand years must be first elapsed, before the soul can return into a human body: but the first Marcellus was slain in the second Punic war; and how many hundred years were yet wanting to the accomplishing his penance, may with ease be gathered, by computing the time betwixt Scipio and Augustus. By which it is plain, that Virgil cannot mean the same Marcellus; but one of his descendants, whom I call a new Marcellus, who so much resembled his ancestor, perhaps in his features and his person, but certainly in his military virtues, that Virgil cries out, quantum instar in ipso est! which I have translated,

Note VII.

Virgil borrowed this imagination from Homer, Odysses xix. line 562. The translation gives the reason, why true prophetic dreams are said to pass through the gate of horn, by adding the epithet transparent, which is not in Virgil, whose words are only these:

What is pervious to the sight is clear; and (alluding to this property) the poet infers such dreams are of divine revelation. Such as pass through the ivory gate, are of the contrary nature—polished lies. But there is a better reason to be given; for the ivory alludes to the teeth, the horn to the eyes. What we see is more credible, than what we only hear; that is, words that pass through the portal of the mouth, or "hedge of the teeth;" which is Homer's expression for speaking.

ÆNEÏS,

BOOK VII.

ARGUMENT.

King Latinus entertains Æneas, and promises him his only daughter, Lavinia, the heiress of his crown. Turnus, being in love with her, favoured by her mother, and stirred up by Juno and Alecto, breaks the treaty which was made, and engages in his quarrel Mezentius, Camilla, Messapus, and many other of the neighbouring princes; whose forces, and the names of their commanders, are particularly related.