LITERARY INNOVATIONS
Fronto, about 100 to about 175 A. D.—Gellius, born about 125 A. D.—Apuleius, about 125 to about 200 A. D.—Innovations in poetry—The Pervigilium Veneris.
An important figure in the literature of the second century was Marcus Cornelius Fronto, of Cirta, in Numidia. Fronto. He was born about 100 A. D., studied under the best teachers, and was distinguished as an orator and teacher even under Hadrian, though his greatest influence was exerted under the Antonines. He became a member of the senate under Hadrian, and his speech against the Christians may have been delivered before that body. In 143 A. D. he was consul, and was to have been proconsul entrusted with the government of Asia, but relinquished that office on account of ill health. He was the teacher of Marcus Antoninus and Lucius Verus, both of whom were much attached to him, and as was natural under such circumstances, he was greatly honored and became very wealthy. Of his family life we know only that he was married, that his daughter Gratia married Gaius Aufidius Victorinus, and that five daughters were removed by death. The date of his death is unknown, but it was probably shortly after 175 A. D. Parts of Fronto’s correspondence were discovered in 1815, and from his letters, we get an idea of his style and his teaching. The correspondence is with Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus, Antoninus Pius, and others, and several essays are included, which were probably sent with the letters to Fronto’s correspondents. One of these essays, the Principia Historiæ compares the Parthian campaigns of Verus and Trajan to the advantage of Verus. This essay was intended to serve as an introduction to a history of the deeds of Verus in the Parthian War, but the history was never written. What gives Fronto’s letters their chief interest is his teaching in regard to oratory and style. He considers rhetoric the noblest possible study, and warns Marcus Aurelius against surrendering to the charms of philosophy, but the chief end of the study of rhetoric is to acquire new and striking words and phrases. Fronto apparently despaired of acquiring new ideas or new points of view, and he saw that Latin literature could not go on forever merely imitating the writers of the Golden Age, or even those of the Silver Age. He was too much of a scholar to think of drawing from the living spring of common every-day speech, and therefore hit upon the expedient of reverting to the early writers, such as Ennius, Plautus, Accius, Cato, Sallust, and Gracchus. His language is therefore full of old-fashioned expressions used without the simplicity that belongs to the early times. That such a writer as Fronto was highly respected and exerted a powerful influence upon his contemporaries is a sign of the depth to which Roman literature had sunk.
A much younger man than Fronto, but like him, a man of books and an admirer of archaic phraseology, was Aulus Gellius, who was born probably about 125 A. D., studied under various masters at Rome and at Athens, and held some judicial position at Rome. Aulus Gellius. His extant work, entitled Noctes Atticæ (Attic Nights), received its title from the fact that it contains the results of the writer’s labors begun at Athens, when he used to read various authors and make extracts from them in the night. These extracts, with a variety of notes and comments, are arranged in twenty books, all of which are preserved except the eighth, of which we have only the table of contents, and the end of the twentieth. The subjects treated are language and literature, law, philosophy and natural history. Gellius quotes no contemporary authors, but introduces them as speakers, for parts of his work have the form of dialogues. There is no order in the arrangement of subjects, but things are put down as Gellius happened to find them in the works he read. No critical faculty is exhibited, nor has Gellius any marked literary skill. He is simply a diligent compiler, whose work is interesting and valuable to us merely because it preserves fragments of earlier works now lost and information about a variety of subjects.
The Latin of the Golden Age was a more or less artificial language developed by the genius of the great writers from the common language of every-day life. Changes in Latin. The Latin of the Silver Age was a development from the literary Latin of the Golden Age, not directly from the popular speech. While literary Latin was thus passing through various phases, the popular speech was also developing along its own lines, and by the second century after Christ was very different from the literary Latin of the time as well as from any Latin, whether spoken or written, of the Ciceronian or earlier times. It had already entered upon the course of change which was in the end to lead to the birth of the Romance languages. Fronto, in his desire to infuse new life into the worn-out literary Latin of his day, went back to the writers before Cicero and adopted their words and phrases, at the same time exerting himself to arrange words in unusual order with the intention of giving piquancy to his expression. His precepts and example were followed by others, as, for instance, Gellius, and still more clearly, Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus as they appear in their letters to their teacher. But Fronto, although he had great influence for a time, could not turn the stream of progress backward. If literary Latin was to develop anything new, it must be by adopting something from the living speech of the people. This course was followed, in a measure, at least, by Apuleius.
Apuleius (the prænomen Lucius is doubtful) was, like Fronto, an African, though he may have been of Roman descent. Apuleius. He was born probably about 125 A. D., at Madaura, on the borders of Numidia and Gætulia. He was educated at Madaura, Carthage, and Athens, travelled extensively, and was for a time in Rome, where he was employed as an advocate. He married Æmilia Pudentilla, a wealthy widow of Oea, in Africa, and was accused by her relatives of having led her into the marriage by means of magic arts. His defense against this charge is the extant book De Magia (On Magic), also called the Apologia. In its present form the book is a revised and enlarged edition of the speech in court. Apuleius was evidently acquitted, and he became a man of great influence and reputation. He prided himself on his versatility, wrote and spoke both Greek and Latin, and confined himself to no one branch of literature, but was orator, poet, scientist, philosopher, and novelist, without, however, displaying any great originality in any direction. He preferred to call himself a Platonic philosopher, but his chief activity was that of a travelling orator, or sophist, who went from place to place giving public exhibitions of his skill in composing and delivering interesting speeches on all sorts of subjects. He seems to have spent most of his life in Africa, and he held the office of priest of the province (sacerdos provinciæ) at Carthage. He was initiated into the mysteries of Isis and seems to have been one of those who sought in the mystic worship of foreign deities the satisfaction of their religious yearnings which the Roman state religion did not give. He seems to have been opposed to Christianity, though he nowhere mentions it directly. His great reputation and the number of works ascribed to him would seem to indicate that he lived to a good age, but the date of his death is unknown.
The extant works of Apuleius are the Metamorphoses, a novel in eleven books, the Apologia, a book on spirits especially the familiar spirit of Socrates, De Deo Socratis, two books on the doctrines of Plato, De Dogmate Platonis, and a collection of extracts from his speeches entitled Florida. Works of Apuleius. The dialogue Asclepius, the treatise On the World (De Mundo), and the treatise published as the third book on Plato’s teachings, are not by Apuleius. Of these works the most interesting is the novel entitled Metamorphoses, in which are narrated the adventures of a certain Lucius of Corinth, who was changed by magic into an ass, and in that form passed through many vicissitudes and saw and heard many strange things, until he was finally restored to human form by the aid of the goddess Isis, to whose service he afterwards devoted himself. This story is derived from a Greek original which appears in abbreviated form among the writings falsely ascribed to Lucian, under the title Lucius or The Ass. Apuleius amplified his Greek original by inserting nearly twenty stories that have no connection with the plot. These are usually introduced in an unskillful way, interrupting the narrative and destroying the unity of the work, but they are in themselves the most interesting parts of the whole novel. The longest and most famous among them is the charming story of Cupid and Psyche, beautifully rendered by William Morris in his Earthly Paradise. This mystic love tale was derived, like the other tales inserted in the story of Lucius, from a Greek original. It is not an invention of Apuleius, but he inserted it in his novel, and thus preserved it to later times.
The style of Apuleius is not the same in his different works. Everywhere, to be sure, he aims at striking effect by means of unusual words arranged in peculiar order, and of sentences curiously broken up into short rhythmical members, very different in effect from the dignified, sonorous periods of Cicero and other classical writers. The style of Apuleius. But in the Metamorphoses he adopts many expressions from the common speech of the people, whereas in his oratorical and philosophical works he reverts, like Fronto, to the early writers. Apuleius and Fronto, both Africans, are the chief representatives of the elocutio novella, the new rhetoric, which broke with the continuous tradition of classical Latin and tried to infuse new life into Latin literature. Neither Fronto nor Apuleius was a man of great inventive genius. Both imitated the Greek sophists of their time, such as Maximus of Tyre and Ælius Aristides, not only in the subject matter of their discourses, but to some extent in their style; yet the fact that they wrote and spoke in Latin and tried to influence the course of Latin literature gives them an importance not possessed by any of the later Greek sophists except Dio Chrysostom and Lucian. Apuleius was apparently more gifted by nature than Fronto, and his works show a surprising ability in the use of language, which makes up in a measure for the lack of originality in thought. Of his extant works the Metamorphoses is the most important. It not only shows the qualities of the elocutio novella more completely than any other work, but it gives a picture of the life of the times, with its superstitions, loose morals, robberies, friendships, hospitalities, and social amenities. Moreover, it has preserved to us many interesting tales, among them the story of Cupid and Psyche. Owing probably to the supernatural elements in the Metamorphoses and to the fact that he had been accused of magical arts, Apuleius came soon after his death to be regarded as a mighty sorcerer, and as a sorcerer he was associated with Virgil in mediæval times.
While Fronto, Apuleius, and others were practising the elocutio novella in prose, attempts were made to introduce innovations in poetry. Innovations in poetry. Terentianus Maurus, who wrote in verse a handbook on letters, syllables, and metres toward the end of the second century, mentions poetæ novelli, and Diomedes, a grammarian of the latter part of the fourth century, speaks of poetæ neoterici, to whom he ascribes a variety of innovations. The names of several of these poets are mentioned, but too little is known of them to awaken any interest in their personalities. Their innovations seem to have consisted largely of verbal juggling, a remarkable example of which is seen in these lines:
Here lines three and four are lines one and two read backward. Other examples are less elaborate, but show the same spirit, the same foolish playing with words. From such things as this no new life could be infused into poetry, and most of the verses preserved to us from the second and even the third centuries after Christ are little more than feeble echoes of the distant music of Virgil. Nevertheless there are already indications of the new mediæval spirit, which was not to find its full development until the days of the minnesinger and the troubadours. The Pervigilium Veneris. Whether the Pervigilium Veneris (Night-watch of Venus) belongs to the second century or the third is not certain. At any rate it is the most striking early example of the romantic sentiment peculiar to mediæval and modern times. The poem is written for the spring festival of Venus Genetrix, whose worship was revived and encouraged by Hadrian. It is therefore probable that it belongs to the second century. It consists of ninety-three trochaic septenarii (the rhythm of Tennyson’s Locksley Hall), a verse freely used by the early Latin poets, but hardly to be found in the first century after Christ. At irregular intervals the refrain:
is repeated. In the beginning of the poem,
may well have suggested to Tennyson the lines:
At the end of the poem the lines:
sound like the wail of the old literature, which no spring was to awaken to new song. Indeed, the Pervigilium Veneris is almost as much mediæval as classical. Its quantitative rhythm coincides with the natural accent of the words, it is full of assonances that suggest both alliteration and rhyme, its spirit is almost modern in its sentiment; and even in its grammatical structure, especially in the use of the preposition de, it points forward to the great changes to come.
In prose and verse alike, the second century after Christ was a period of innovations. The new methods of Fronto and Apuleius did not hold their own for any great length of time, but they serve as symptoms of the decay of Latin speech, and may even have hastened that decay by turning men away from the continued imitation of the classic writers. The history of classical Roman literature may be said to end with Suetonius. But something of the old spirit survived even into the period of the Middle Ages and affected strongly the literature of the Christian church. For this reason it is well to give a brief sketch of early Christian literature in Latin, and of the surviving remnants of pagan literary activity in the third and fourth centuries.
EARLY CHRISTIAN WRITERS
Minucius Felix, about 160 A. D.—Tertullian, about 160 to about 230 A. D.—St. Cyprian, about 200-258 A. D.—Commodianus 249 A. D.—Arnobius, about 290 A. D.—Lactantius, about 300 A. D.
The Christians are mentioned by Tacitus, the younger Pliny, and Suetonius, but in such a way as to show that their religion was misunderstood and their growing importance little appreciated. The beginning of Christian literature in Latin. But as time went on, Christianity and the Christians became more and more important. Various means were tried to suppress them, for their belief and their practises were opposed to the state religion and seemed inimical to the state itself. Yet the new religion continued to gain in the number and influence of its converts, and in the second century Christian writings begin to appear in Latin. The new religion had been founded in the eastern part of the empire, and its first literary productions were in Greek, a language which continued for many years to be the chief medium of expression for Christian thought. No sketch of the development of Christianity, even in the western part of the empire, could be given without more than a mere mention of the early Greek Christian writings; but the development of Christianity is a subject quite outside of the scope of this book, which is concerned with Christian literature only in so far as it was written in Latin. Nor is it possible in a book of this kind to do more than mention briefly the chief Christian writers and their works, leaving all discussion of their doctrines to the historians of the church.
The first Christian writer of Latin is Marcus Minucius Felix, of whose life nothing is known except that he was a barrister (causidicus) at Rome, that he was a pagan in early life, and that he became a Christian. Minucius Felix. His only extant work is a defense of Christianity entitled Octavius, which was written probably not far from 160 A. D. The introduction tells how Minucius., with his two friends Octavius and Cæcilius, was walking by the seashore at Ostia. Cæcilius saluted a statue of Serapis which they happened to pass, whereupon Octavius rebuked Minucius for letting his friend remain in ignorance of the true religion. They continue their walk, but Cæcilius can not let the rebuke of Octavius pass. At last the three friends sit down, Cæcilius undertakes the defense of the old religion, Octavius that of the new, and Minucius is to be judge of their arguments. Cæcilius argues that it is absurd for persons of little education, such as are most Christians, to think that they can settle questions which have puzzled the wisest philosophers. The Roman religion should therefore be retained, especially as the power of the gods has often been shown. An attack upon the lives and ceremonies of the Christians follows, which is interesting as a proof of the ignorance that prevailed in pagan circles. Cæcilius then attacks the Christian belief in a future life, and ends with a recommendation of skepticism. His speech is vigorous and even vehement, showing marked rhetorical training. Octavius in his reply takes up the various points raised by Cæcilius and replies to them in order. He lays the chief stress upon the unity of God and the absurdities of pagan polytheism and philosophy. There is no argument based upon the crucifixion or the resurrection of Christ, no argument that is strictly Christian. There is no appeal to faith or to love, but only to reason, and the arguments are not drawn from the Bible, but from the works of pagan philosophers, especially Cicero’s De Natura Deorum and Seneca’s writings, or from the experiences of human life. When Octavius has finished, Cæcilius declares that he is convinced and the friends separate.
The Octavius is different from other early writings in defense of Christianity, inasmuch as it bases no argument upon the Bible and makes no appeal to the emotions. These peculiarities are most easily explained by the theory that Minucius wrote his treatise as a reply to a speech of Fronto against Christianity, that he put the substance of Fronto’s speech into the mouth of Cæcilius, and then, in the person of Octavius, refuted it point for point. In style Minucius attains at times an almost classic elegance and simplicity, though he shows the influence of the rhetorical schools of the Silver Age and is sometimes needlessly emphatic. He continues the tradition of the classical school, with no trace of the affectations or innovations of Fronto or Apuleius. Apart from its interest as the earliest specimen of Christian writing in Latin, the Octavius deserves to be read as the most attractive Latin prose after the time of Trajan.
Minucius Felix is known to us by only one short work, in which he displays conservative literary taste, cultivated imagination, and ability to conduct an argument calmly and dispassionately. Tertullian. Tertullian, a much more important figure than Minucius in the history of the church, is known by a great body of writings, in which the qualities he shows are almost the opposite of those we admire in Minucius. Yet Tertullian is an interesting and powerful figure in the history of literature as well as in that of the church. Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus was born at Carthage, probably about 160 A. D., and may have died about 230 A. D. At any rate, the period of his chief activity was in the reigns of Septimius Severus and Caracalla. In early life he was a pagan, but was converted to Christianity, possibly through his wife, who was a Christian. He attained the position of presbyter in the church. In middle life he became a Montanist—that is, a follower of Montanus, an enthusiast of Ardaba, in Mysia, who declared himself the Comforter promised by Christ, claimed prophetic powers, declared that the end of the world was at hand, and promulgated a variety of strict doctrines and rules for conduct. The writings of Tertullian are from beginning to end controversial. Some of them are in defense of Christianity against the heathen, while others are directed against those Christian beliefs and practises which he does not approve. To the second class belong the writings in support of Montanism, for Tertullian was of such a passionate nature that an argument in support of any doctrine necessarily becomes an attack upon those who hold any other views. As the chief advocate of Montanism in the west, Tertullian softened some of its more obviously absurd doctrines, but could not modify them so far as to make them acceptable to the church at large. He was therefore in constant opposition to the church during the latter part of his life, and at a later time his writings came to be regarded as heretical. Nevertheless, his works were much read, and his Apologeticus was even translated into Greek.
Tertullian exercised the greatest influence upon the Latin of the church, for up to his time most speculative Christian writing had been in Greek, and he was therefore obliged to invent or adapt the suitable means for the expression of those thoughts and ideas which were unknown to the pagan writers. Style of Tertullian. He is justly regarded as the founder of western, as opposed to eastern or Greek, theology. His style is harsh, inelegant, and sometimes obscure, but vigorous and animated. His eloquence is that of intense earnestness rather than of careful training. His vocabulary is not strictly classic, but contains expressions taken from the popular speech and from Greek, as well as others which he seems to have formed for himself. He has been called the Cicero of the church, but whatever the greatness of his eloquence, it has little resemblance in quality to that of Cicero. Only in a few orations does Cicero approach the enthusiastic earnestness of Tertullian, and the polished beauty of Cicero’s periods is utterly lacking to Tertullian’s rugged utterance. His style has more resemblance in detail to that of his fellow-African Apuleius, but shows no evidence of conscious imitation. He uses short sentences, as a rule, and even his long sentences have no periodic structure; he strives for effect by means of unnatural expressions; he delights in antitheses, plays on words, and even rhymes. His Latin is hard to read, but his originality of thought and his passionate earnestness of purpose compensate fully for his defects of style. With Minucius Felix Christian writing in Italy appears as an attempt to express Christian thoughts, or at least to defend the Christian religion, with all the elegance of classical Latinity. Tertullian writes with vigor and enthusiasm, hampered by no classical traditions. The relative importance of the Italian and African schools may be judged in a measure by the difference in extent between the brief treatise of Minucius and Tertullian’s voluminous writings. For nearly two centuries the style of Tertullian predominates, being only gradually assimilated to the classical norm, until St. Augustine fixes the Latin of the church by forming a style in which the African elements are subordinate.
The beginning of this change is seen even in the writings of Tertullian’s admirer, St. Cyprian. Thascius Cæcilius Cyprianus was born of pagan parents about 200 A. D. The place of his birth is unknown, but we are informed that he was an African. He received a good education and became a teacher of rhetoric. Cyprian. After his conversion he became a presbyter, and in 248 or 249 A. D. was chosen bishop of Carthage, not without opposition. From January 21, 250 A. D., until the beginning of March in the following year, he lived in concealment to escape the persecution of the Christians under Decius. His avoidance of martyrdom at this time was severely criticized, but he defended it on the ground that his life was necessary to the welfare of the church. In 257 A. D. a new persecution was instituted by the Emperor Valerian, and Cyprian was banished to Curubis, but afterwards recalled to Carthage and confined to his gardens. When ordered to appear before the proconsul at Utica he fled, but returned to his gardens when the proconsul came to Carthage. He was arrested September 13, 258 A. D., and on the following day was tried, condemned, and executed. Cyprian’s writings comprise thirteen treatises and eighty-one letters, among which are several letters manifestly by other authors. Some of the treatises or tracts are addressed to individuals, and some of the letters are to all intents and purposes tracts, so that the division into two classes is not easy to carry out consistently. His writings are partly in defense of Christianity against paganism, partly for the encouragement of the Christians in persecution, and partly on various points of church discipline. His letters are especially valuable for the light they throw upon church history. His doctrines are orthodox, and his writings were therefore not open to the objections urged against those of Tertullian. He was, however, an ardent admirer of Tertullian, and shows the constant influence of his teachings. His style is easier and simpler than Tertullian’s, always clear, and often attractive. Although he lacks Tertullian’s originality, he excels him in ability to express his thoughts so as to appeal to the reader.
The earliest Christian poet is Commodianus. Of his life little is known, and the statement that he was born at Gaza, in Syria, is based upon a somewhat doubtful interpretation of the title of one of his poems.133 Commodianus. In early life he was a pagan, but was converted, and became a bishop. His works consist of a long poem in defense of Christianity (Carmen Apologeticum) and a collection of eighty short poems called Instructions (Instructiones per Litteras Versuum Primas) so composed that the initial letters of the lines spell the titles of the poems. The Carmen Apologeticum contains references which fix its date in 249 A. D. The poems are remarkable for the earnestness of their Christian feeling and still more for their metrical peculiarities. The hexameters are divided into halves, and at the end of each half the rules for quantity are observed, while in the rest of the verse those rules are disregarded. The lines are not merely faulty hexameters, but a new and original combination of quantitative verse and prose. In the Carmen Apologeticum the lines are arranged in pairs, so that each pair forms a distich. The most remarkable part of the Carmen Apologeticum is the fantastic description of the end of the world with which the poem closes. The Instructiones are divided into two books, the first warning the heathen and the Jews to lay aside their errors, the second containing advice for the various classes of Christians. In spite of the dryness of his style Commodianus is interesting as the earliest Christian poet, and the student of language finds in his poems many words and constructions taken from the common speech of the people.
Much less interest attaches to the seven books Adversus Nationes (Against the Gentiles) by Arnobius, who wrote under Diocletian (284-305 A. D.). Jerome says that Arnobius was a distinguished rhetor at Sicca in Africa, who opposed Christianity for a long time. Arnobius. When he became converted the bishop demanded a proof of his faith, whereupon he wrote a work against the heathen and was received into the church. Whether this report is accurate or not, a work is extant under the name of Arnobius, entitled Adversus Nationes, which shows by its style that the author had been trained in the practise of rhetoric. The first two books defend the Christians against the accusations of their enemies, especially the charge that the misfortunes of the world were due to the progress of Christianity and the neglect of the old gods. The five remaining books proceed to show the absurdities of polytheism and the foolishness of the pagan forms of worship. Arnobius has little knowledge of the Christian religion and little originality of thought. The only doctrine peculiar to him is his theory that the soul is not immortal by nature, but may become immortal through the grace of God. His style is disfigured by its excessive vehemence and artificial rhetoric, which shows, however, that the author was carefully educated. This appears also in his discussion of pagan philosophy and religion, and indeed the chief interest attaching to the books Adversus Nationes is their testimony to the manner in which an educated pagan employed his education in the service of Christianity.
Lactantius (Lucius Cæcilius Firmianus Lactantius) was a pupil of Arnobius, according to Jerome’s statement, and was called by Diocletian with the grammarian Flavius to teach Latin rhetoric at Nicomedia, in Bithynia, a Greek city in which teachers of Latin found few patrons. Lactantius. Lactantius was therefore poor and had leisure for writing. When he was converted to Christianity is not known, but it can not have been before he reached middle life. In his old age he was called by the Emperor Constantine to be the tutor of his son Crispus. Nothing remains of writings by Lactantius before his conversion, but his later works, both prose and verse, are numerous. The most important are the seven books entitled Institutiones Divinæ (Divine Institutions, an exhaustive philosophical work in support of Christianity against paganism), after which should be mentioned the treatises De Opificio Dei (On the Work of God, a discussion of creation and the nature of man), De Ira Dei (On the Wrath of God, dealing with the current theories of Providence), a fanatical work on the deaths of the persecutors from Nero to Galerius (De Mortibus Persecutorum), and a curious poem On the Phœnix. The treatise De Opificio Dei is Christian only in its general tendency, and contains no direct reference to Christianity. This is probably because it was written at the time of the persecution under Diocletian (303 A. D.). The poem On the Phœnix (that fabulous bird that builds a nest, burns itself up, reappears among the ashes as a worm, grows to an egg, is hatched, and flies away to renewed life) shows many traces of Christianity but contains no direct reference to the new religion. Lactantius was well educated in the learning of the pagans, and when he became a Christian did not forget what he had learned before. His style is purer than that of his Christian predecessors, being modelled upon that of Cicero. For this reason the name “Christian Cicero” has been applied more appropriately to him than to Tertullian, though in power of eloquence Tertullian, with all his harshness of style, is the greater.
The second century, which saw the birth of Christian literature in Latin, produced, as we have seen, several writers of real power, and as the third century opened, Christian literature gained, in the person of Lactantius, a writer who possessed at the same time elegance of style. With Lactantius the African school of Christian writing approaches the classical style of Minucius Felix, and the path is made straight for the writings of St. Jerome and St. Augustine. From this time on, the real life of Latin literature is seen in Christian rather than in pagan writings.
PAGAN LITERATURE OF THE THIRD CENTURY
Terentianus, about 200 A. D.—Quintus Serenus Sammonicus, about 200 A. D.—Nemesianus, 283 A. D.—Reposianus, toward 300 A. D.—Vespa, late in the third century—Hosidius Geta, early in the third century—Disticha Catonis—Marius Maximus, about 165-230 A. D.—Ælius Julius Cordus, about 250 A. D.—The Historia Augusta—Domitius Ulpianus, killed 228 A. D.—Julius Paulus, first half of third century—Cornelius Labeo—Quintus Gargilius Martialis—Censorinus, 238 A. D.—Gaius Julius Solinus—Gaius Julius Romanus, early third century—Marius Plotius Sacerdos, latter part of third century—Aquila Romanus—Ælius Festus Aphthonius, end of third century—The panegyrists: Eumenius, Nazarius, Mamertinus, Drepanius.
While Christian literature was developing in the third century the pagan literature dragged on its senile existence. Pagan poetry of the third century. There was little poetry that deserved the name, though skill in versification was not uncommon. Terentianus wrote in verse his handbook of metres about the beginning of the century, and not far from the same time Quintus Serenus Sammonicus composed a medical handbook containing sixty-three recipes in 1,107 hexameters. He does not pretend to be a physician, but derives his wisdom, such as it is, from Pliny and other writers. The recipes are of various kinds, some recommending the use of herbs in a simple and sensible way, while others prescribe more or less disgusting compounds of animal matter, and a few are nothing more nor less than magic charms. So fevers are to be cured by wearing tied to one’s neck a bone found within the enclosure of a house, and a cure for another fever is found in a piece of paper inscribed in the proper manner with the magic formula abracadabra, which is to be worn round the neck of the patient. To the credit of Sammonicus it should be said that his knowledge of metre is greater than his knowledge of medicine; but even that does not raise his handbook to the level of poetry. A writer of much better quality, who even deserves to be called a poet, is Marcus Aurelius Olympius Nemesianus, who wrote, in the year 283 A. D., a poem On Hunting (Cynegetica), 325 lines of which are preserved, and who is also the author of four eclogues formerly attributed to Calpurnius (see page 188). The discussion of dogs, horses, hunting-nets, and the like in the Cynegetica can hardly be called poetry, but the eclogues, though written in close imitation of Calpurnius, who was himself an imitator of Virgil, show some genuine poetic spirit. There is also some poetic beauty in the poem on the love of Mars and Venus, by Reposianus, written toward the end of the third century, but not so much can be said in praise of Vespa’s metrical argument between a baker and a cook (Indicium Coci et Pistoris Iudice Vulcano) as to the relative merits of their callings, or of the epigrams and “echo verses” of Pentadius. These last consist of elegiac distichs so written that the first words of the hexameter are repeated or “echoed” at the end of the pentameter. Such verse has little relation to poetry, but shows that there was still an interest felt in the technique of metrical writing. That the study of the classic writers, especially of Virgil, was diligently cultivated, is shown by the existence of poems composed entirely of Virgilian lines and fragments of lines. A remarkable extant specimen of such work is the short tragedy Medea, probably written by Hosidius Geta, near the beginning of the third century. Several anonymous poems add little to our admiration for the poets of the third century, but the so-called Disticha Catonis should be mentioned because they gained great and long-continued popularity. They are maxims of every-day wisdom expressed in distichs of two hexameters. Such maxims are: “Regard it as the first virtue to hold your tongue; he is nearest God who knows how to keep a wise silence”; or, “Be sure to tell many of another’s kindness, but keep silence about the kindnesses you have done to others.” These distichs were soon imitated, and similar maxims in one line—monostichs— were also written. They are hardly poetry, but have some interest because of their popular nature.
The prose of the third century possesses even less interest than the verse. Pagan prose in the third century. The only historians worthy of the name—Dio Cassius and Herodian—wrote in Greek. Marius Maximus (about 165-230 A. D.) continued Suetonius’s lives of the emperors from Nerva to Heliogabalus, and about the middle of the century Ælius Julius Cordus wrote lives of the more obscure emperors. These works are lost, but, like those of several other writers of this period, were used by the authors of the so-called Historia Augusta, a collection of lives of the emperors from Hadrian to Numerianus (117-284 A. D.). These lives were written by six authors, four of whom, Ælius Spartianus, Julius Capitolinus, Vulcacius Gallicanus, and Trebellius Pollio, wrote under Diocletian (284-305 A. D.), while the remaining two, Ælius Lampridius and Flavius Vopiscus, belong to the early part of the fourth century. They are all alike in the poverty of their style and their liking for petty personal details. The books on the Prætorian Edict by Domitius Ulpianus, who was killed in 228 A. D., and by his younger contemporary, Julius Paulus, as well as other juristic works of the third century, were important contributions to the development of Roman law, and the attempt made by Cornelius Labeo in his lost work on the Roman religion to explain the pagan cult would probably, if it were preserved, be interesting as an attempt to defend the old religion against skepticism and Christianity. The extant parts of the work of Quintus Gargilius Martialis on agriculture, veterinary medicine, the use of healing herbs, and the like, show that the whole was a compilation from the works of Pliny the elder and other writers by a man who had sense and judgment; the treatise On Birthdays (De Die Natali), written in a lively and easy style by a grammarian Censorinus in 238 A. D., is a compilation from Suetonius, Varro, and others, of information concerning the birth and life of a man, astrology, music, and some other matters; and the Collection of Things Worth Remembering (Collectanea Rerum Memorabilium), by Gaius Julius Solinus, contains valuable information about early Roman history (to Augustus) and the geography of the ancient world, with especial attention to oddities and peculiarities, whether of the countries or their inhabitants; but none of these works is of independent literary importance. The grammatical writings of Gaius Julius Romanus, who lived in the first years of the third century, were much used by Charisius somewhat more than a century later. A grammar (Ars Grammatica) in three books by Marius Plotius Sacerdos, written in the latter part of the century, is extant, as is also a brief rhetorical treatise by Aquila Romanus. The four books On Metres by Ælius Festus Aphthonius, written under Diocletian, are lost, but their contents are in part preserved by Marius Victorinus. These grammatical works are of importance chiefly for their references to earlier literature.
None of the prose works just mentioned exhibits any creative talent or testifies to any new literary development. The only new literary phenomenon of the period is the rise of a school of oratory in Gaul, which produced, to be sure, nothing of great importance, but which shows by its very existence how far removed from Rome were now the centres of intellectual life, when the great Christian writers were Africans and the pagan orators were Gauls. The Gallic orators avoided the harshness and obscurity of the African school, and wrote in smooth Ciceronian Latin, with a plentiful flow of words and a poor supply of ideas. The panegyrists. A collection of twelve panegyrics has been preserved, the first of which is Pliny’s address in honor of Trajan, delivered in 100 A. D., while the remaining eleven are dated at different times from 291 to 389 A. D. One of these was delivered in 297 A. D. by Eumenius, a teacher of Greek descent, but Gallic birth, for the benefit of the schools in his native town of Augustodunum (Autun), and three (perhaps four) of the others are probably by the same author. Three of the remaining speeches are assigned to known authors and dates. They are by Nazarius, in honor of Constantine (321 A. D.); by Mamertinus, in honor of Julian (362 A. D.); and by Latinus Drepanius Pacatus, in honor of Theodosius (389 A. D.). Two of these orators belong to the second half of the fourth century, but their speeches resemble the others in the collection, all of which are full of most exaggerated praise of the emperors. These speeches contain many references to the history of the times, but must be used with great care by the historian, since their purpose is to praise the emperors, and not even historical facts must be allowed to cast a shadow upon the imperial glory. The Gallic school of oratory was evidently flourishing in the later years of the third century and the greater part at least of the fourth. It was a learned school, based upon imitation of the ancient classics, and standing in no close relation to the living language of the times. The extant speeches show how thoroughly the study of the classics was carried on in Gaul, and at the same time how ready the orators were to flatter emperors who were pleased to listen to their obsequious praise.
Now that the chief centres of Latin literature are found to be in Gaul and Africa, not in Rome or even Italy, the history of Roman literature has apparently reached its end; and yet throughout the fourth century, yes, even into the sixth century, the stream of old Roman tradition can be traced, and in the poems of Ausonius and Claudian and the De Consolatione Philosophiæ of Boëthius classical literature still survives. It is hard to fix a date for the beginning of the Middle Ages, and even harder to assign a definite time for the end of classical Roman literature. The first great independent and original Christian writings in Latin—those of Tertullian—may be regarded as the beginning of mediæval literature; but classical Latinity was by no means yet dead. In fact, in the fourth century, after Constantine had recognized Christianity as a state religion on an equal footing with the ancient belief, there was a revival of literature. Christian writers wrote in the ancient Roman manner, and secular writings by Christians are not to be distinguished from those of the adherents of the old religion. The religious writings of the leaders of Christian thought—St. Hilary, bishop of Poitiers, St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan, St. Jerome and St. Augustine— belong to the history of the church rather than to that of Roman literature, and can be mentioned here only in passing, while the writings of many lesser lights of the church must be altogether neglected. There still remain, however, many works in which something of the old Roman literary spirit survives, even after Rome herself has ceased to be the seat of empire.
THE FOURTH AND FIFTH CENTURIES
Nonius, early in the fourth century—Macrobius, 410 (?) A. D.—Martianus Capella, about 400 A. D.—Firmicus Maternus, 354 (?) A. D.—Marius Victorinus, about 350 A. D.—Ælius Donatus, about 350 A. D.—Charisius, about 350 A. D.—Diomedes, about 350 A. D.—Priscian, about 500 A. D.—Servius, latter part of the fourth century—Itineraries—Notitia, 354 A. D.—Peutinger Tablet—Palladius, about 350 A. D.—Vegetius, about 400 A. D.—Aurelius Victor, 360 A. D.—Eutropius, 365 A. D.—Festus, 369 A. D.—Julius Obsequens, about 360 A. D.—St. Jerome, 331-420 A. D.—Ammianus Marcellinus, about 330-400 A. D.—Sulpicius Severus, early in the fifth century—Orosius, 417 A. D.—Gregorianus, about 300 A. D.—Hermogenianus, about 330 A. D.—Codex Theodosianus, 438 A. D.—The Code of Justinian, 529 A. D.—The Pandects and Institutes, 533 A. D.—Symmachus, about 345-405 A. D.—Dictys (L. Septimius), second half of the fourth century—Dares, fifth century—Hilarius, about 315 to 367 A. D.—Ambrose, about 340-397 A. D.—Jerome, 331-420 A. D.—Augustine, 354-430 A. D.—Optatianus, early in the fourth century—Juvencus, early in the fourth century—Avienus, 370 A. D.—The Querolus, about 370 A. D.—Ausonius, about 310 to about 395 A. D.—Prudentius 348 to about 410 A. D.—Claudian, 400 A. D.—Namatianus, 416 A. D.—Avianus, about 400 A. D.—Sedulius, about 450 A. D.—Dracontius, end of the fifth century.
The prose writings of the fourth century are, with the exception of theological treatises, almost all mere compilations or abbreviations of earlier works. In the early years of the century Nonius Marcellus, a Peripatetic philosopher of Thubursicum, in Numidia, wrote for his son a work in twenty books, De Compendiosa Doctrina, in which he discusses many questions pertaining for the most part to early Latin literature. This work is modelled on the Noctes Atticæ of Gellius, to which it is vastly inferior. It is nevertheless of value as our only authority for the titles of some lost works and even for extracts from them. Nonius. Macrobius. Martianus Capella. For similar reasons the Saturnalia, in seven books, by Ambrosius Theodosius Macrobius, is of some importance. Macrobius, who was probably, like Nonius, an African, appears to be identical with the Macrobius who was proconsul of Africa in 410 A. D. The imaginary conversations of which his Saturnalia consists treat of Roman literature and antiquities, especially of the poetry of Virgil. Like Gellius and Nonius, Macrobius uses the works of earlier critics and commentators, and gives many quotations from Greek and Roman authors. Macrobius also wrote a commentary on Cicero’s Dream of Scipio, in which he quotes many authors, especially Greeks, but displays little or no originality. The encyclopædia, in nine books, written about the end of the fourth century by a third African, Martianus Capella, is of less value than the compilations of Nonius and Macrobius, though it, too, goes back to good authorities, such as Varro.
The chief seat of philosophy in the fourth century was Athens, and philosophical writings were almost all in Greek. Philosophy. Grammar. For the most part they expounded the mystical doctrines of Neoplatonism.134 The grammarian Ælius Donatus, who flourished at Rome about 350 A. D. and was one of the teachers of St. Jerome, wrote commentaries on Terence and Virgil to which he prefixed the lives of the two poets from the lost work of Suetonius. The work on Virgil is lost, and the commentary on Terence contains in its present form many later additions. The extant grammars (Ars Grammatica) of Charisius and Diomedes, which have preserved much of the learning of earlier grammarians, belong to a very slightly later time. The last and most complete ancient grammar was written under the Emperor Anastasius (491-518 A. D.) at Constantinople in the Latin language by Priscian, from Cæsarea, in Mauretania. This work, in eighteen books, is entitled Institutiones Grammaticæ, and contains a vast quantity of material from the earlier literature. Much of the grammatical terminology, even of the present time, is derived from Priscian. The important commentary on Virgil by Servius was written in the latter part of the fourth century, and is preserved in two forms, in one of which numerous additions have been made to the original work.135
In 360 A. D., Aurelius Victor wrote a short history of the emperors (Cæsares) from the time of Augustus to the tenth consulship of Constantius and Julian, i. e., to the date of his writing. He makes free use of Suetonius, and his style is sometimes an imitation of that of Sallust. History. A second entirely distinct work attributed to the same author is a brief epitome of the history of the emperors to the death of Theodosius I (395 A. D.). Under Valens (364-378 A. D.) Eutropius wrote a Breviarium ab Urbe Condita, a short sketch of Roman history from the beginning to the year 365 A. D., which is distinguished for its simple, easy style and pure Latinity, but has no independent value as an historical work.136
Much more important is the Chronicle of St. Jerome (331-420 A. D.), a translation from the Greek of Eusebius with important additions. The Chronicle begins with the first year of Abraham (2016 B. C.). From this point to the Trojan War, Jerome merely translates Eusebius, from the Trojan War to 325 A. D. he translates Eusebius and adds much information concerning Roman history and literature, and from 325 to 378 A. D. the work is entirely his own. His information concerning the history of Roman literature is derived chiefly from Suetonius (De Viris Illustribus) and is of the utmost importance, though the dates given are sometimes wrong, which is not surprising when one remembers the carelessness in respect to dates exhibited by Suetonius in his extant Lives of the Cæsars. Jerome’s Chronicle was continued in the fifth century by Prosper of Aquitania to the year 455 A. D., and further additions were made after that time. The Chronicle is of great importance to the historian, but is itself merely the dry bones of history. The only real history that the last centuries of Roman literature produced, the only serious and original historical work after Tacitus, is that of
Ammianus Marcellinus; for the summary of universal history (Chronicorum Libri II) written by the Aquitanian Sulpicius Severus in the early years of the fifth century, and the more pretentious but no more original history of the world (Historiarum Adversus Paganos Libri VII) by Orosius of Spain, compiled soon after 417 A. D., are even less important than the handbook of Eutropius.
Ammianus Marcellinus (about 330-400 A. D.) was a Greek of Antioch, who became a soldier in the Roman army, served in Asia, in Gaul, and in the Persian campaign of the Emperor Julian, and was at some time in Egypt, but finally settled at Rome, where he wrote in Latin a continuation of Tacitus from Nerva to the death of Valens (96-378 A. D.). Ammianus Marcellinus. The entire work consisted of thirty-one books, thirteen of which are lost; but the extant books (XIV-XXXI), treating of the time from 353 to 378 A. D., and dealing with events in which the author took part, are especially valuable. Ammianus is an honest soldier, who, to use his own expression, never knowingly corrupts the truth by silence or falsehood, who has no liking and not much understanding for court intrigues, but is intent upon giving his readers a fair and unbiased account of events. His Latin is hard to understand, partly because he writes it as a foreigner, but still more because he wishes to write an ornate style and embellishes his work with many references to the Roman classics, sometimes quoting their exact words, oftener changing them a little, as if to show his perfect familiarity with the earlier literature. The geographical digressions introduced are not original descriptions of what Ammianus had himself seen, but are taken from Greek or Latin books. Although himself a pagan, Ammianus shows no hostility to Christianity, but his paganism is not very serious. He seems to believe that not all men think alike, and that on the whole it is well for each to believe as he can. His pictures of the life of the times are admirable, and bring before us in a clear light the corruption and degeneration of the age. Yet he does not seem to feel righteous indignation nor to understand that the greatness of the Roman empire is rapidly passing away. His history ends with the disastrous defeat of the Romans by the Goths at Hadrianople and the death of the Emperor Valens; but so accustomed was the world to the power of the Roman empire that even this terrible reverse was not recognized as portending the end of the ancient order of things. For a little while Theodosius was able to maintain the integrity of the empire, but the end was at hand. It is not unfitting that the last Roman historian, himself a Greek by birth, ends his work at a moment when more than ever before the Greek city of Constantinople was becoming the refuge of what remained of the old Roman civilization.
The study of law, which had for centuries been among the most important pursuits of Roman thinkers, was not neglected in the last centuries of Roman life. Law. Under Diocletian (284-305 A. D.) the imperial edicts were codified by Gregorianus, and in the reign of Constantine (323-337 A. D.) Hermogenianus continued the codification to his own time. In 438 A. D., under Theodosius II, the Codex Theodosianus was compiled by a commission of jurists, and in the reign of Justinian a commission headed by the distinguished jurist, scholar, and man of affairs Tribonian, gave to Roman law its final form in three great works: the Code, published in 529 A. D., the Pandects or Digests, and the Institutes, published in 533 A. D., which have served as the basis for all later jurisprudence.
Oratory found its chief field of activity in the Christian pulpit from the time of Constantine, but was not confined to the exposition of Christian doctrine. The Gallic school of oratory continued to flourish, and indeed Gaul was prominent in literature of all kinds during the fourth and fifth centuries. Oratory. Among other orators the most important was Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, a Roman of noble family and honorable character, whose life extended from about 345 to 405 A. D. His panegyrics on Valentinian I and Gratianus resemble the other panegyrics of the period, and the fragmentary remains of later speeches delivered in the senate show no greater ability. More interesting are his letters, in which he appears as an imitator of the younger Pliny, and his official reports as prefect of the city.
A curious prose version of the story of the Trojan War was written by Lucius Septimius, apparently in the second half of the fourth century. Dictys and Dares. This purports to a translation of an ancient Greek manuscript in Phœnician letters found in the tomb of a certain Dictys, in Crete. The story of the discovery of the manuscript is undoubtedly an invention, but the Latin account may be a translation of a lost Greek original. The style is artificial and full of antiquated expressions. The author most persistently imitated is Sallust. A somewhat similar little work belonging to the fifth century pretends to be a translation by Cornelius Nepos of a Greek account of the Trojan War given by a Phrygian Dares, who fought among the Trojans. The style is dry and unattractive, but the little book was much read in the Middle Ages. These two works serve to give us some idea of the kind of literature which, alongside of the Greek novels, amused the leisure hours of cultivated persons.
The contents of the works of the leaders of the church in the fourth and fifth centuries can hardly be considered in a history of Roman literature, but inasmuch as their writings show the continued influence of classical Latin, their style and choice of words should be briefly mentioned. Hilarius. The bitter controversy between the Arians and the Athanasians produced in the fourth century a great number of controversial writings, among which those of Hilarius (St. Hilary), Bishop of Poitiers, are remarkable for depth of philosophical thought and care in expression. Hilarius was born between 310 and 320 A. D., and was trained in the Gallic school of eloquence. After his conversion to Christianity he soon became bishop of his native Poitiers. His opposition to Arianism, which Constantius favored, led to his banishment, but he was recalled after three years, in 358 A. D. His death took place in 367 A. D. Besides his controversial writings he was the author of commentaries on several books of the Old and New Testaments, and perhaps also of hymns. His style shows in some passages his early training in the school of wordy and ornate Gallic oratory, but is chiefly distinguished for its vigor and passion. Hilarius carried on the work of adapting Latin to the expression of Christian abstract thought, which had been begun in Africa by Tertullian.
Ambrosius (St. Ambrose), who lived from about 340 to 397 A. D., was probably born in Gaul, where his father was prefect, but was of Roman, not Gallic blood. Ambrosius. After a careful education he became a barrister, and was soon raised to the consular rank and made governor of the provinces of Liguria and Æmilia. Thus he came to Milan, where he was chosen bishop in 374 A. D. He was a man of great tact as well as firmness, who dared to exclude the Emperor Theodosius from the church, until he had shown repentance for the massacre at Thessalonica, and to refuse the request of the Empress Justina that one of the churches at Milan be set aside for the Arians, but who succeeded in avoiding any breach with the emperor in spite of his independence. It was in great part due to St. Ambrose that Italy was kept from adopting the Arian heresy. His writings comprise letters, dogmatic treatises, practical treatises on the conduct of life, commentaries on the Scriptures, funeral orations on Valentinian II and Theodosius, and hymns. He is also the probable author of a translation of Josephus into Latin. In his mystic, allegorical interpretations of Scripture St. Ambrose follows the Jewish-Stoic philosopher Philo, who lived about the time of Christ, and in his treatise On Duties he imitates Cicero’s work of the same title. His intimate acquaintance with other works of the classical period is made evident both by the general quality of his style, which is purer than that of most of his contemporaries, and by many special references. His hymns have had great influence upon church poetry and music.
St. Jerome (Hieronymus) was born about 331 A. D., at Stridon, a town on the borders of Dalmatia and Pannonia, studied at Rome under Donatus, then spent two years at Treves, was afterwards at Aquileia for some time, then sailed to Syria. Jerome (Hieronymus). Here he was ill for a time, and solaced himself by reading the classics, until he was warned by a dream to give up profane literature. He retreated into the wilderness of Chalcis, where he remained five years. In 362 A. D. he returned Rome, where he had great influence for many years, but in 386 he retired to a monastery at Bethlehem. There he remained until his death, in 420 A. D. As a controversial writer St. Jerome had great influence in settling the doctrines of the Catholic church; he also wrote commentaries on various books of the Bible, and numerous letters dealing with religious questions. His translation of the Bible was a masterly performance, and is the basis of the Latin Vulgate, still in use in the Roman Catholic church. He compiled a brief work, De Viris Illustribus, in which he gave sketches of the lives of Christian writers, as Suetonius, in his work of the same title, had given the lives of the old Roman authors. The sketches given by Jerome are, however, much briefer than were those of Suetonius. The translation and continuation of the Chronicle of Eusebius has already been mentioned (see page 262). St. Jerome is one of the ablest writers of the early Christian church, and certainly the most learned Christian writer of his time. His style is not exempt from the faults of exaggeration and verbal quibbling common in the writings of the age, but possesses much life and earnestness, and is free from the affectation of classicism, though it shows the effect of his prolonged study of the classics.
St. Augustine (Aurelius Augustinus) was born in 354 A. D. at Tagaste, in Africa. Augustine. His father was a pagan, his mother a Christian, and in his early years Augustine himself accepted the doctrine of Manicheeism, a sort of mystical materialism, which denied all authority, and claimed to rest entirely upon reason. He was a successful teacher of rhetoric in Africa, at Rome, and at Milan, where he came under the influence of St. Ambrose and was converted. In 388 A. D. he returned to Africa, became presbyter at Hippo in 392, and bishop in 395 A. D. His death took place in 430 A. D. His nature was many sided, and composed of apparently contradictory elements. He was a mystic speculator, a sharp reasoner, at one time harsh and uncompromising, at another full of tenderness, an original thinker yet a believer in authority, dreamer, poet, philosopher, rhetorician, and quibbler in one. His writings are in part speculations on theology, in part ponderings on the soul, its nature and its relations to God, and in part controversial treatises, sermons, commentaries, and letters. The best known among them are the Confessions, in which Augustine gives many details of his life, and records the doubts that perplexed him, and the City of God (De Civitate Dei), a work of his old age, in which he contrasts the city (or better, the state) of this world with the ideal city of God. This work was written in reply to the pagans, who claimed that the sack of Rome by Alaric was due to the neglect of the ancient worship. It consists of twenty-two books, in the first ten of which the “vain opinions adverse to the Christian religion” are refuted, while the twelve remaining are devoted to a presentation of Christian truth, though each division contains many digressions, and in each the part of the subject properly belonging to the other is treated as occasion demands. In many parts of this great work reference is made to Cicero’s De Re Publica and other philosophical writings, and Augustine’s dialogue Contra Academicos is an evident imitation of Cicero’s Academics. Yet it can not be said that Augustine’s style is modelled upon that of Cicero. It is rather a style which had gradually developed among Christian writers, in which the periodic structure of the Ciceronian age is abandoned for the most part, many words unknown to strictly classical Latin have been introduced, partly from the popular speech and partly by new formation to express abstract ideas, not a few Biblical phrases are employed, and some slight changes in syntax are noticeable. This is the Latin of the church, which has remained nearly as St. Augustine left it, except in so far as the strictly classical element grew less in the centuries preceding the Renaissance. For St. Augustine the “state” of this world still means the Roman empire, though the eternal city had been sacked by the Goths, but the time seems to him not far distant when the state of God shall rest in the “stability of its eternal seat.” So his language is still Latin; but his thoughts and sentiments are Christian, not Roman. The ancient world was still visible about him, but the life of the Middle Ages had begun.
The fourth century produced a considerable number of poets who possessed no mean skill in versification, but whose works have for the most part disappeared. Optatianus. Optatianus (Publilius Optatianus Porphyrius) composed a poem in praise of Constantine in which he shows his ingenuity by writing lines that take the shape of an altar or an organ, contriving to make fifteen successive hexameters each one letter shorter than its predecessor, making nineteen stanzas of four lines each from the same twenty words, and inventing the most complicated and elaborate acrostics and the like. Such work is not poetry, but it shows skill in the manipulation of words. It is interesting to know that Constantine was so pleased that he recalled the ingenious author from banishment. Juvencus. About the same time Juvencus (Gaius Vettius Aquilinus Juvencus) made a version of the Gospel story in hexameters after the manner of Virgil. He shows intelligent appreciation of the dignity and beauty of his model, and writes skillfully and easily. Avienus. This Latin poem is the prototype of the “Gospel Harmonies” of the Middle Ages. Avienus (Rufus Festus Avienus), of Vulsinii, in Etruria, was a descendant of the Stoic philosopher Musonius Rufus (see page 177), and was twice proconsul—in Africa in 366 and in Greece in 371 A. D. He translated the Phænomena of Aratus into Latin verse, and tried to improve upon the translations by Cicero and Germanicus (see pages 70 and 173), made a similar translation with variations from the Periegesis of Dionysius, described the coasts of the Black Sea, the Caspian, and the Mediterranean in iambic trimeters, and made abridgments of Livy and Virgil in the same metre. These last are lost, as is a large part of the description of the coasts. Avienus was also the author of several short poems. He has no little ability as a maker of verses, and has the good taste to imitate Virgil, but exhibits no poetic originality. His language is for the most part strictly classic. Querolus. To about the same time as Avienus belongs also a curious comedy entitled Querolus (The Discontented Man), a free imitation of the Aulularia of Plautus, composed in a remarkable mixture of prose and verse.
The only really interesting poet of the fourth century is, however, Ausonius, whose life extends through nearly the entire century. Decimus Magnus Ausonius was born at Bordigala (Bordeaux) about 310 A. D. Ausonius. He became a teacher of rhetoric and oratory, and was appointed tutor to Gratian, the son of the Emperor Valens. When Gratian became emperor he rewarded his teacher with public offices, and raised him in 379 A. D. to the consulate. After Gratian’s death (383 A. D.) Ausonius retired from public life and devoted himself to literary pursuits at his native Bordeaux until his death, which took place not far from 395 A. D. Nearly all his extant writings belong to this period. The only considerable specimen of his prose extant is the oration in which he expressed his thanks to Gratian for the consulship. In this the style, though somewhat flowery, is not without dignity, and the vocabulary is pretty strictly classic. The extant poems are of various kinds and in various metres. They include epigrams, idylls, letters, a series of short poems called Parentalia, devoted to the poet’s relatives, a Commemoratio Professorum Burdigalensium, describing his colleagues at Bordeaux, verses on the Roman emperors, on famous cities, and a variety of other subjects. Some of these show cleverness in the use of language, but no higher quality. Such are the letters written partly in Greek and partly in Latin, and the idylls so composed that the last word of each line is a monosyllable; but among the poems are some of considerable interest even though their poetic qualities are not of the highest. So the Parentalia and the verses on the Bordeaux professors give the reader some insight into the life of an important provincial city. It is interesting, too, to observe that of the seventeen cities mentioned in the List of Famous Cities five are in Gaul. To be sure, Ausonius was himself a Gaul, and may have made his native region unduly prominent, but other evidence, including the remains of ancient buildings, supports his estimate of the importance of the Gallic cities. His lines on Bordeaux, famous for its wine, its culture, its fertile soil, great rivers, copious water supply, and fine buildings, show his patriotism and his skill in descriptive writing. The latter quality is conspicuous in the most famous of his idylls, the one entitled Mosella, in which Ausonius describes the stream and the valley of the Moselle, which he had visited on some business not further specified. The vine-clad hills and grassy meadow lands, the roofs of villas that stand upon the banks, the broad, clear river, calm and placid as a lake, are all brought before our eyes with clear, well-chosen words and a masterly lightness of touch. At the same time the poet’s love of nature and her beauties is as plainly manifest as in any poem of Wordsworth or Whittier. Unfortunately, Ausonius proceeds to mention all the different kinds of fish in the Moselle, and the remarkable productivity of the river does not add to the attractiveness of the poem. Yet the poem is deservedly famous for its beauty of expression and its enthusiastic love of nature. It is also remarkably modern in its tone. Satyrs and Naiads are mentioned, but only as a modern poet might mention them. Ausonius is a Christian, and for him the pagan deities of the woods are only beings which he “might imagine.” This poem shows as clearly as the Pervigilium Veneris, though in a different way, that the spirit of the Middle Ages was awake.