The Project Gutenberg eBook of Illustrated History of Ancient Literature Oriental and Classical, by John D. Quackenbos, A.M., M.D..

“By polish and embellishment of style the orator recommends himself to his auditors in his proper character; in his other efforts he courts the approbation of the learned, in this the applause of the multitude. Cicero, in pleading the cause of Cornelius, fought with arms that were not only stout, but dazzling; nor would he, merely by instructing the judge, or by speaking to the purpose in pure Latin and with perspicuity, have caused the Roman people to testify their admiration of him not only by acclamations, but even by tumults of applause. It was the sublimity, magnificence, splendor, and dignity of his eloquence, that drew forth that thunder of approbation.

This grace of style may contribute in no small degree to the success of a cause; for those who listen with pleasure are both more attentive and more ready to believe; they are very frequently captivated with pleasure, and sometimes hurried away in admiration. Thus the glitter of a sword strikes something of terror into the eyes; and thunderstorms themselves would not alarm us so much as they do, if it were their force only, and not also their flame, that was dreaded. Cicero, accordingly, in one of his letters to Brutus, makes with good reason the following remark: ‘That eloquence which excites no admiration, I account as nothing.’ Aristotle, also, thinks that to excite admiration should be one of our greatest objects.

But let the embellishment of our style be manly, noble, and chaste; let it not affect effeminate delicacy, or a complexion counterfeited by paint, but let it glow with genuine health and vigor. Should I think a piece of land better cultivated, in which the owner should show me lilies, anemonies, and violets, and fountains playing, than one in which there is a plentiful harvest, or vines laden with grapes? Should I prefer barren plane-trees, or clipped myrtles, to elms embraced with vines, and fruitful olive-trees? The rich may have such unproductive gratifications; but what would they be, if they had nothing else?

Whatever may be attractive in conception, elegant in expression, pleasing in figures, rich in metaphor, or polished in composition, the orator, like a dealer, as it were, in eloquence, will lay before his audience for them to inspect, and almost to handle; for his success entirely concerns his reputation, and not his cause. But when a serious affair is in question, and there is a contest in real earnest, anxiety for mere applause should be an orator’s last concern. Indeed, no speaker, where important interests are involved, should be very solicitous about his words.”—Watson.

Among the lesser lights of the first Christian century were Quintus Curtius, who compiled a “History of Alexander the Great;” Columella, a writer on agriculture; Pomponius Mela, the first Latin geographer; Probus, the grammarian; Valerius Flaccus, who wrote the epic “Argonautica,” in imitation of Apollonius Rhodius; and Silius Italicus, author of a third-rate epic on the Punic Wars.

AGE OF TRAJAN AND THE ANTONINES.

Juvenal (40-125 A.D.), the single poet of this age, ranks with Rome’s great writers. The accounts of his life are fragmentary and obscure. A native of Aqui’num in Latium, he came to Rome, and was apparently a student of rhetoric, perhaps an advocate. A chance lampoon on an actor revealed to him his satirical talent, and forthwith he applied himself to that branch of poetry in which he became so eminent. Too modest at first to read his satires even before his friends, Juvenal postponed publishing them until his sixtieth year, when they took Rome by storm. Sixteen of them survive.

His fierce diatribes not unnaturally gave offence in high places; and at length the emperor Ha’drian[49] quietly sent their author off to Egypt, to command a Roman cohort stationed there—a disgrace which brought the old satirist in sorrow to the grave.

Juvenal probed Roman society to its very depths, laying bare vices of the blackest dye. In his day, the degenerate masters of the world even out-sodomed Sodom in depravity. Nobles and emperors openly perpetrated the vilest crimes. High-born ladies, in male attire, entered the arena to fight like gladiators; revelled in reckless extravagance; plunged into immoralities that call up a blush in the very recital, and even added the arts of the poisoner to their accomplishments. Thus the poet exclaims against these fashionable murderesses:—

In the blaze of his satire Juvenal brought out the representative characters of his time. Parasites, hypocrites, and panders, upstarts, legacy-hunters, and gamblers, ballet-dancers and fortune-tellers, gluttons and sots,—defile before us in his pages till we turn with nausea from the revolting panorama. Well might the poet sigh:—

Juvenal’s vividness of description and minuteness of detail show him to have been personally familiar with the vices he lashed; that he kept himself unspotted we can neither assert nor deny. His satires are full of moral precepts and virtuous sentiments; the Tenth, perhaps the gem of the collection, has lent more thoughts and expressions to modern times than any other Latin poem of equal length. It closes with a beautiful petition:—

Brevity, intensity, and vigor, are conspicuous elements in our author’s style. He always used “the best words in the right places.” Said Dryden, his only peer in satiric poetry, “Juvenal gives me as much pleasure as I can bear.” We extract from the Tenth Satire one of his most graphic passages:—

Tacitus (54-118 A.D.).—Foremost among the prose writers of this later period was Caius Cornelius Tacitus, by some considered the greatest of Roman historians. Of his early life we know nothing, though as a youth he seems to have mastered those arts which afterward made him a successful orator. In the reign of Vespasian he took to wife the daughter of Julius Agricola, the Roman governor of Britain, and began a public career which culminated under Nerva (97 A.D.) in the consulship. After this he probably confined his attention to literature, busying himself with the compilation of historical works until death put an end to his labors.

The first of these in the order of time was the “Agricola,” an admirable biography of the author’s father-in-law, “the hero of a hundred fights, the conqueror of those warlike islanders whom the mighty Julius left to their original freedom, and whom Claudius and his captains imperfectly subdued.” It is particularly valuable for the light it casts on the history of Britain, and the influence of Roman institutions.

“Agricola,” said Tacitus, “gave private encouragement and public aid to the building of temples, courts of justice, and dwelling-houses, praising the energetic and reproving the indolent. Thus an honorable rivalry took the place of compulsion. He likewise provided a liberal education for the sons of the chiefs, and showed such a preference for the natural powers of the Britons over the industry of the Gauls that they who lately disdained the tongue of Rome now coveted its eloquence. Hence, too, a liking sprung up for our style of dress, and the toga became fashionable. Step by step they were led to things which dispose to vice—the lounge, the bath, the elegant banquet. All this, in their ignorance, they called civilization.”

The “Agricola” was followed by “the Germania,” a treatise on the situation, customs, and tribes of Germany, in whose freedom-loving warriors Tacitus saw an enemy to be feared. What more caustic satires than his telling contrasts of their simple habits with Roman luxury, their stern morality with Roman profligacy? The Germania may be regarded as a warning from a patriotic historian to his vice-ridden, enervated countrymen—a warning which they would have done well to regard. Particularly pleasing are its picturesque sketches of German life, written in concise, vigorous language.

The remaining works of Tacitus are his “Histories,” “Annals,” and a Dialogue on “the Decline of Eloquence.” The Histories covered the reigns of the Roman emperors from Galba to Domitian inclusive (69-96 A.D.); about one-third of the work is preserved. The genius of Tacitus did ample justice to the tremendous issues of this eventful period, described by him as follows:—

“I am entering on the history of a period rich in disasters, frightful in its wars, torn by civil strife, and even in peace full of horrors. Four emperors perished by the sword. There were three civil wars: there were more with foreign enemies: there were often wars that had both characters at once. Now, too, Italy was prostrated by disasters, either entirely novel or that recurred only after a long succession of ages. Cities in Campania’s richest plains were swallowed up and overwhelmed; Rome was wasted by conflagrations, its oldest temples were consumed, and the Capitol itself was fired by the hands of citizens. Never, surely, did more terrible calamities of the Roman people, or evidence more conclusive, prove that the gods take no thought for our happiness, but only for our punishment.”

In the “Annals” (sixteen books), which traced the history of the emperors from the death of Augustus up to the point at which the Histories had opened, the voice of the indignant satirist is everywhere heard. Portions of this work, which were published about 115 A.D., are lost. We extract the historian’s vivid description of the burning of Rome.

“There followed a dreadful disaster, whether fortuitously or by the wicked contrivance of the prince is not determined, for both are asserted by historians. But of all the calamities which ever befell this city from the rage of fire, this was the most terrible. It broke out in that part of the Circus which is contiguous to mounts Palatine and Cœlius, where, by reason of shops in which were kept such goods as minister aliment to fire, the moment it commenced it acquired strength, and being accelerated by the wind, it spread at once through the whole extent of the Circus. For neither were the houses secured by enclosures, nor the temples environed with walls, nor was there any other obstacle to intercept its progress; but the flame, spreading every way impetuously, invaded first the lower regions of the city, then mounted to the higher; then again ravaging the lower, it baffled every effort to extinguish it, by the rapidity of its destructive course, and from the liability of the city to conflagration in consequence of the narrow and intricate alleys, and the irregularity of the streets in ancient Rome.

Add to this the wailings of terrified women, the infirm condition of the aged, and the helplessness of childhood; such as strove to provide for themselves, and those who labored to assist others; these dragging the feeble, those waiting for them; some hurrying, others lingering; altogether created a scene of universal confusion and embarrassment. While they looked back upon the danger in their rear, they often found themselves beset before, and on their sides; or if they had escaped into the quarters adjoining, these too were already seized by the devouring flames; even the parts which they believed to be remote and exempt, were found to be in the same distress.

At last, not knowing what to shun or where to seek sanctuary, they crowded the streets, and lay along in the open fields. Some, from the loss of their whole substance, even the means of their daily sustenance, others, from affection for their relatives whom they had not been able to snatch from the flames, suffered themselves to perish in them, though they had opportunity to escape. Neither dared any man offer to check the fire: so repeated were the menaces of many who forbade to extinguish it; and because others openly threw fire-brands, with loud declarations ‘that they had one who authorized them;’ whether they did it that they might plunder with less restraint, or in consequence of orders given.

Nero, who was at that juncture sojourning at Antium, did not return to the city till the fire approached that quarter of his house which connected the palace with the gardens of Mæcenas; nor could it, however, be prevented from devouring the house, and palace, and everything around. But for the relief of the people thus destitute and driven from their dwellings, he opened the field of Mars, and even his own gardens. He likewise reared temporary houses for the reception of the forlorn multitude; from Ostia and the neighboring cities were brought household necessaries, and the price of grain was reduced to three sesterces (about 11½ cts.) the measure. All which proceedings, though of a popular character, were thrown away, because a rumor had become universally current, that at the very time when the city was in flames Nero, going on the stage of his private theatre, sung ‘The Destruction of Troy,’ assimilating the present disaster to that catastrophe of ancient times.

At length, on the sixth day, the conflagration was stayed by pulling down an immense quantity of buildings, so that an open space and, as it were, void air, might check the raging element by breaking the continuity.... But not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the gods, availed to relieve Nero from the infamy of being believed to have ordered the fire. Hence, to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the guilt and punished with the most exquisite tortures, the persons commonly called Christians, who were hated for their enormities.[53] Christus, the founder of that sect, was put to death as a criminal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea, in the reign of Tiberius; but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time, broke out again, not only through Judea, where the mischief originated, but through the city of Rome also, whither all things horrible and disgraceful flow from all quarters, as to a common receptacle, and where they are encouraged.

Accordingly, first those were seized who confessed they were Christians; next, on their information, a vast, multitude were convicted, not so much on a charge of burning the city as of hating the human race. And in their deaths they were also made the subjects of sport, for they were covered with the hides of wild beasts and worried to death by dogs, or nailed to crosses, or set fire to, and when day declined burned to serve for nocturnal lights.[54] Nero offered his own gardens for that spectacle, and exhibited a Circensian game, indiscriminately mingling with the common people in the habit of a charioteer, or else standing in his chariot. Whence a feeling of compassion arose toward the sufferers, though guilty and deserving to be made examples of by capital punishment, because they seemed not to be cut off for the public good, but victims to the ferocity of one man.”

Suetonius, a contemporary of Tacitus, appears to have been born in the reign of Vespasian. His literary labors began in Trajan’s time; and under Hadrian he occupied the honorable position of private secretary, which, however, he lost in consequence of disrespect to the empress.

The best-known of his works, and the only one that has been preserved entire, is his “Lives of the Twelve Cæsars,” full, interesting, and trustworthy in its information, clear and vigorous in style. The “Cæsars” of Suetonius has always been a standard. The Romans dwelt on his stories with gusto; but in such frightful colors did he paint the deeds of Caligula that the tyrant Com’modus made death by wild beasts the penalty for reading his life of that emperor. After the invention of printing, editions of Suetonius multiplied rapidly.

“Some signs and omens he regarded as infallible. If in the morning his shoe was put on wrong, the left instead of the right, that boded some disaster. If when he commenced a long journey, by sea or land, there happened to fall a mizzling rain, he held it to be a good sign of a speedy and happy return. He was much affected likewise with anything out of the common course of nature. A palm-tree which chanced to grow up between some stones in the court of his house, he transplanted into a court where the images of the household gods were placed, and took all possible care to make it thrive. He also observed certain days; as never to go from home the day after the market-days, nor to begin any serious business upon the nones.”

“Caligula evinced the savage barbarity of his temper by the following indications. When flesh was only to be had at a high price for feeding his wild beasts, he ordered that criminals should be given them to be devoured. After disfiguring many persons of honorable rank, by branding them in the face with hot irons, he condemned them to the mines, to work in repairing the highways, or to fight with wild beasts; or, tying them by the neck and heels, would shut them up in cages, or saw them asunder.

Nor were these severities inflicted merely for crimes of great enormity, but for making remarks on his public games, or for not having sworn by the Genius of the emperor. He compelled parents to be present at the execution of their sons; and to one who excused himself on account of indisposition, he sent his own litter. He burned alive the writer of a farce, for some witty verse which had a double meaning. A Roman knight, who had been exposed to the wild beasts, crying out that he was innocent, Caligula called him back, and having had his tongue cut out, remanded him to the arena.

Even in the midst of his diversions, while gaming or feasting, this savage ferocity never forsook him. Persons were often put to the torture in his presence, while he was dining or carousing. At Puteoli, at the dedication of the bridge, he invited a number of people to come to him from the shore, and then suddenly threw them headlong into the sea; thrusting down with poles and oars those who, to save themselves, had got hold of the rudders of the ships. As often as he met with handsome men, who had fine heads of hair, he would order the back of their heads to be shaved, to make them look ridiculous. At a sumptuous entertainment, he fell suddenly into a violent fit of laughter, and upon the consuls’, who reclined next to him, respectfully asking him the occasion, ‘Nothing,’ replied he, ‘but that upon a single nod of mine, you might both have your throats cut.’

In profuse expenditure he surpassed all the prodigals that ever lived; inventing a new kind of bath, washing in precious unguents, both warm and cold, drinking pearls of immense value dissolved in vinegar, and serving up for his guests loaves and other victuals modelled in gold. He built two ships with ten banks of oars, the sterns of which blazed with jewels while the sails were of various colors. They were fitted up with baths, galleries, and saloons, and supplied with a great variety of vines and fruit-trees. In these he would sail in the daytime along the coast of Campania, feasting amidst dancing and concerts of music.”

“Among other things, people wondered at the indifference and absent-mindedness of Claudius. Placing himself at table a little after Messalina’s death, he inquired, ‘Why does not the empress come?’ Many of those he had condemned to death, he ordered the day after to be invited to his table, and to game with him, and sent to reprimand them as sluggish fellows for not making greater haste. The following expression he had in his mouth at all hours, ‘What! do you take me for a fool?’

A man engaged in litigation before his tribunal drew Claudius aside and told him, ‘I dreamt I saw you murdered;’ and shortly afterward, when the defendant came to deliver his plea to the emperor, the plaintiff, pretending to have discovered the murderer, pointed to him as the man he had seen in his dream: whereupon, as if he had been taken in the act, he was hurried away to execution.”—Dr. Thomson.

Pliny the Younger (62-113 A.D.), nephew and adopted son of the naturalist, learned his early lessons from Quintilian and other celebrated rhetoricians. After figuring for a time as a successful advocate, he was elevated to the consulship, and in Trajan’s reign, having served his second term as consul, received the appointment of governor of Bithynia.

Pliny took a prominent stand as the champion of the wronged, and delighted in compelling dishonest governors to disgorge their stolen spoils. The eloquent speeches identified with his name have perished, with the exception of a single specimen, a panegyric on Trajan. It is as a letter-writer that Pliny is entitled to a place among the worthies of Latin literature. His epistles to his friends and the emperor (in ten books) are among the most pleasing relics of antiquity, affording, as they do, many instructive glimpses of contemporary society. They are written with life and polish, and show their author to have been “the perfect type of a pagan gentleman.”

While governor of Bithynia, Pliny corresponded frequently with Trajan on official business. We give below one of his letters in relation to the Christians, with Trajan’s reply.

“I had never attended at the trial of a Christian; hence I knew not what were the usual questions asked them, or what the punishments inflicted. I doubted, also, whether to make a distinction of ages, or to treat young and old alike; whether to allow time for recantation, or to refuse all pardon whatever to one who had been a Christian; whether, finally, to make the name penal, though no crime should be proved, or to reserve the penalty for the combination of both. Meanwhile, when any were reported to me as Christians, I followed this plan. I asked them whether they were Christians. If they said yes, I repeated the question twice, adding threats of punishment; if they persisted, I ordered punishment to be inflicted. For I felt sure that whatever it was they confessed, their inflexible obstinacy well deserved to be chastised. There were ever, some Roman citizens who showed this strange persistence; those I determined to send to Rome.

As often happens in cases of interference, charges were now lodged more generally than before, and several forms of guilt came before me. An anonymous letter was sent, containing the names of many persons, who, however, denied that they were or had been Christians. As they invoked the gods and worshipped with wine and frankincense before your image, at the same time cursing Christ, I released them the more readily, as those who are really Christians cannot be got to do any of these things. Others, who were named to me, admitted that they were Christians, but immediately afterward denied it; some said they had been so three years ago, others at still more distant dates, one or two as long ago as twenty years. All these worshipped your image and those of the gods, and abjured Christ. But they declared that all their guilt or error had amounted to was this: they met on certain mornings before daybreak, and sung one after another a hymn to Christ as God, at the same time binding themselves by an oath not to commit any crime, but to abstain from theft, robbery, adultery, perjury, or repudiation of trust. After this was done, the meeting broke up; they, however, came together again to eat their meal in common, being quite guiltless of any improper conduct. But since my edict forbidding (as you ordered) all secret societies, they had given this practice up.

However, I thought it necessary to apply the torture to some young women who were called ministræ (deaconesses), in order, if possible, to find out the truth. But I could elicit nothing from them except evidence of some debased and immoderate superstition; so I deferred the trial, and determined to ask your advice. For the matter seemed important, especially since the number of those who run into danger increases daily. All ages, all ranks, and both sexes, are among the accused, and the taint of the superstition is not confined to the towns; it has actually made its way into the villages. But I believe it possible to check and repress it. At all events, it is certain that temples which were lately almost empty are now well attended, and sacred festivals long disused are being revived. Victims too are flowing in, whereas a few years ago such things could hardly find a purchaser. From this I infer that vast numbers might be reformed, if an opportunity of recantation were allowed them.”

“I entirely approve of your conduct with regard to those Christians of whom you had received information. We can never lay down a universal rule, as if circumstances were always the same. They are not to be searched for; but if they are reported and convicted, they must be punished. But if any denies his Christianity and proves his words by sacrificing to our divinity, even if his former conduct may have laid him under suspicion, he must be allowed the benefit of his recantation. No weight whatever should be attached to anonymous communications; they are no Roman way of dealing, and are altogether reprehensible.”—Cruttwell.

During the period under consideration, Florus abridged Livy’s “Annals;” Aulus Gellius (125-175 A.D.) crowded into his “Attic Nights” (a work in twenty books, prepared by night at Athens) a vast store of historical anecdotes and extracts from works now lost; Gaius, the jurist, composed his “Institutes;” and Fronto wrote his epistles.

Apuleius.—Last of the writers of this age, but by no means least when we consider the influence of his tales upon modern fiction, is Apuleius, author of the romance of “the Golden Ass.” Lucius, the hero, an enthusiast in the study of magic, having seen the sorceress Pam’phile transform herself into an owl by rubbing an ointment on her person, endeavors, with the help of her maid, to imitate her example. But the girl selects the wrong box of ointment from her mistress’s cabinet; and Lucius, on applying it, is changed into a donkey.

Hardly, however, had the metamorphosis been effected when a band of robbers made a descent upon the house, loaded a portion of their plunder on the ass’s back, and made good their escape, driving Lucius before them. In search of rose-leaves, which the maid told him would remove the spell, the hero meets with a series of marvellous adventures. Among the episodes introduced is the oft-repeated tale of Cupid and Psy’che. In the Decameron, Don Quixote, and Gil Bias, some of these old Roman stories are told over again.

The style of Apuleius is unnatural; his Latin is bad. Besides “the Golden Ass,” he wrote a discourse on Magic, on “the God of Socrates,” and the “Florida,” a collection of paragraphs from his own orations.

LATER LATIN AUTHORS.

After its temporary revival under Trajan’s kindly rule, Latin literature gradually sunk into a hopeless decline. In the long array of names that represent the last three centuries of the Roman Empire, we find none more worthy of respect than those of the Latin fathers. Greatest of these was

St. Augustine (354-430 A.D.), of whom Tulloch said “no single name has ever made such an impression upon Christian thought.”

Impressed with the truth of the Gospel by the eloquence of Ambrose at Milan, where he had gone to teach rhetoric, Augustine at length received baptism, to the delight of his saintly mother Mon’ica, who had long prayed for his conversion. When raised to the bishopric of Hippo in Africa, Augustine zealously engaged in a controversy with Pela’gius and his followers, who entertained heterodox views in relation to grace and original sin. The bishop put forth fifteen treatises in refutation of the Pelagian heresies. His greatest works were “the City of God,” a vindication of Christianity, “Confessions,” and a treatise on the Trinity.

Ambrose, bishop of Milan, who lived in the last half of the fourth century, was the author of numerous epistles and hymns, the Te Deum being one of his compositions. His “Offices” defines the duties of Christian pastors.

St. Jerome (Hieronymus) (340-420), the great apostle of monasticism, from a convent at Bethlehem promulgated his Latin version of the Old and New Testaments, called the Vulgate (common) because designed for the use of the common people, who understood no language but Latin. Jerome’s Bible, adopted as a standard version, was the first book ever put to press (1455).

St. Gregory, bishop of Constantinople, the last of the four great Latin fathers and the most poetical of early Christian writers, has left us a book of epistles, orations, and religious poems. He pressed into the service of Christianity the arts of Greek rhetoric, and assailed Julian the Apostate in two speeches that recall the invective of the Attic orators.

Tertullian (150-230), “the Master,” one of the earlier Christian authors, is worthy of mention not only for his numerous practical treatises on Penance, Idolatry, Theatrical Exhibitions, etc., but also for his polemical works against unbelievers, and the “Apologeticus” in defence of Christianity. In after-life Tertullian joined a heretical sect.

Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, the pupil of Tertullian, defended his religion with an eloquent pen, and finally laid down his life for his faith (258).

Lactantius, “the Christian Cicero,” was the most learned man of Constantine’s age (306-337). His earliest effort, an hexameter poem, “the Banquet,” gained him such reputation that the emperor Diocletian appointed him to give instruction in rhetoric at Nicomedia. The “Banquet” is lost; but several of the author’s prose works remain, the greatest being his “Divine Institutions.” In his treatise “On the Death of the Persecutors,” Lactantius endeavors to prove the avenging hand of God in the violent ends of those emperors who had oppressed his people.

Boëthius.—Finally, we must notice the famous moral treatise “On the Consolation of Philosophy,” by Boëthius, a Roman noble who outlived the fall of his country (476). A model of integrity and justice, Boëthius was loaded with honors by Theod’oric, the Ostrogothic king of Italy; but at last, falsely accused by his enemies of witchcraft and treason, he was executed by his suspicious master (525).

The above-mentioned work was much read during the Middle Ages. Alfred the Great rendered it into Anglo-Saxon; Chaucer, into English; and later writers have reproduced its sentiments.

SPECIMENS OF LATER POETRY.

As a favorable specimen of later Latin poetry, we quote a few verses from an eclogue on hunting by Nemesian (280), a favorite poet in the time of Charlemagne, extensively read in the schools:—

A different style was that of Claudian, the court poet in the reign of Theodosius the Great (379-395). Tawdry and artificial in general, it was displayed to the best advantage in his amatory pieces and marriage hymns; as in this description of

Ausonius of Bordeaux, an affected verse-maker of the fourth century, wrote much that is second-rate, in the way of epigrams and idyls, too often of a licentious tone; but there is some merit in the following reflections on