you will find he intended an invective against a standing army.
WHAT vast prerogatives, my Gallus, are Accruing to the mighty man of war! For, if into a lucky camp I light, Though raw in arms, and yet afraid to fight, Befriend me, my good stars, and all goes right: One happy hour is to a soldier better, Than mother Juno's recommending letter, Or Venus, when to Mars she would p efer My suit, and own the kindness done to her.
See what our common privileges are: As, first, no saucy citizen should dare To strike a soldier, nor, when struck, resent The wrong, for fear of farther punishment: Not though his teeth are beaten out, his eyes Hang by a string, in bumps his forehead rise, Shall he presume to mention his disgrace, Or beg amends for his demolish'd faces A booted judge shall sit to try his cause, Not by the statute, but by martial laws; Which old Camillus order'd, to confine The brawls of soldiers to the trench and line: A wise provision; and from thence 'tis clear, That officers a soldier's cause should hear: And, taking cognizance of wrongs receiv'd, An honest man may hope to be reliev'd. So far 'tis well: but with a general cry, The regiment will rise in mutiny,
The freedom of their fellow-rogue demand, And, if refus'd, will threaten to disband. Withdraw thy action, and depart in peace; The remedy is worse than the disease: This cause is worthy him, who in the hall Would for his fee, and for his client, bawl: But wouldst thou, friend, who hast two legs alone, (Which, Heaven be prais'd, thou yet may'st call
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Who dares appear thy business to defend? Dry up thy tears, and pocket up th' abuse, Nor put thy friend to make a bad excuse. The judge cries out, "Your evidence produce." Will.he, who saw the soldier's mutton-fist, And saw thee maul'd, appear within the list, To witness truth? When I see one so brave, The dead, think I, are risen from the grave; And with their long spade beards, and matted hair, Our honest ancestors are come to take the air... Against a clown, with more security, A witness may be brought to swear a lie, Than, though his evidence be full and fair, To vouch a truth against a man of war.
More benefits remain, and claim'd as rights, Which are a standing army's perquisites. If any rogue vexatious suits advance Against me for my known inheritance, Enter by violence my fruitful grounds, Or take the sacred land-mark from my bounds, Those bounds, which with possession and with
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Or if my debtors do not keep their day, Deny their hands, and then refuse to pay; I must, with patience, all the terms attend, Among the common causes that depend, Till mine is call'd; and that long look'd-for day Is still encumber'd with some new delay: Perhaps the cloth of state is only spread, Some of the quorum may be sick a-bed; That judge is hot, and doffs his gown, while this O'er night was bowsy, and goes out to piss: So many rubs appear, the time is gone For hearing, and the tedious suit goes on: But buff and belt-meu never know these cares, No time, nor trick of law their action bars: Their cause they to an easier issue put :
They will be heard, or they lug out, and cut.
Another branch of their revenue still Remains, beyond their boundless right to kill, Their father yet alive, impower'd to take a will.. For, what their prowess gain'd, the law declares Is to themselves alone, and to their heirs: No share of that goes back to the begetter, But if the son fights well, and plunders better, Like stout Coranus, his old shaking sire Does a remembrance in his will desire: Inquisitive of fights, and longs in vain To find him in the number of the slain: But still he lives, and, rising by the war, Enjoys his gains, and has enough to spare: For 'tis a noble general's prudent part To cherish valour, and reward desert : Let him be daub'd with lace, live high, and whore; Sometimes be lousy, but be never poor.
TRANSLATIONS FROM PERSIUS.
ARGUMENT OF THE PROLOGUE TO THE FIRST SATIRE.
THE design of the author was to conceal his name and quality. He lived in the dangerous times of the tyrant Nero; and aims particularly at him in most of his satires. For which reason, though he was a Roman knight, and of a plentiful fortune, he would appear in this prologue but a beggerly poet, who writes for bread. After this, he breaks into the business of the first satire; which is chiefly to decry the poetry then in fashion, and the impudence of those who were endeavouring to pass their stuff upon the
PROLOGUE TO THE FIRST SATIRE.
I NEVER did on cleft Parnassus dream, Nor taste the sacred Heliconian stream; Nor can remember when my brain inspir'd, Was, by the Muses, into madness fir'd. My share in pale Pyrene I resign; And claim no part in all the mighty Nine. Statues, with winding ivy crown'd, belong To nobler poets, for a nobler song:
Heedless of verse, and hopeless of the crown, Scarce half a wit, and more than half a clown, Before the shrine I lay my rugged numbers down. Who taught the parrot human notes to try Or with a voice endued the chattering pye?
'Twas witty want, fierce hunger to appease:
But where's that Roman?-Somewhat I would say, But fear; let fear, for once, to truth give way. Truth lends the Stoic courage: when I look On human acts, and read in Nature's book, From the first pastimes of our infant-age, To elder cares, and man's severer page;
Want taught their masters, and their masters these. When stern as tutors, and as uncles hard,
Let gain, that gilded bait, be hung on high,
The hungry witlings have it in their eye :
Pyes, crows, and daws, poetic presents bring : You say they squeak; but they will swear they sing.
We lash the pupil, and defraud the ward: Then, then I say, or would say, if I durstBut thus provok'd, I must speak out, or burst. FRIEND. Once more forbear.
ARGUMENT OF THE FIRST SATIRE.
I NEED not repeat, that the chief aim of the author is against bad poets in this satire. But I must add, that he includes also bad orators, who began at that time (as Petronius in the beginning of his book tells us) to enervate manly eloquence, by tropes and figures, ill-placed and worse applied. Amongst the poets, Persius covertly strikes at Nero; some of whose verses he recites with scorn and indignation. He also takes notice of the noblemen and their abominable poetry, who, in the luxury of their fortunes, set up for wits and judges. The satire is in dialogue, betwixt the author and his friend or monitor; who dissuades him from this dangerous attempt of exposing great men. But Persius, who is of a free spirit, and has not forgotten that Rome was once a commonwealth, breaks through all those difficulties, and boldly arraigns the false judgment of the age in which he lives. The reader may observe that our poet was a stoic philosopher; and that all his moral sentences, both here and in all the rest of his satires, are drawn from the dogmas of that sect.
IN DIALOGUE BETWIXT THE POET AND HIS FRIEND OR MONITOR.
How anxious are our cares, and yet how vain
The bent of our desires !
PRIEND. Thy spleen contain: For none will read thy satires. PERSIUS. This to me?
PERSIUS. I cannot rule my spleen:
My scorn rebels, and tickles me within.
First, to begin at home: our authors write In lonely rooms, secur'd from public sight; The prose is fustian, and the numbers lame. Whether in prose, or verse, 'tis all the same : All noise, and empty pomp, a storm of words, Labouring with sound, that little sense affords. They comb, and then they order every hair: A gown, or white, or scour'd to whiteness, wear: Next, gargle well their throats, and thus prepar'd, A birth-day jewel bobbing at their ear. They mount, a God's name, to be seen and heard. From their high scaffold, with a trumpet cheek, And ogling all their audience ere they speak. The nauseous nobles, ev'n the chief of Rome, With gaping mouths to these rehearsals come, And pant with pleasure, when some lusty line The marrow pierces, and invades the chine. At open fulsome bawdry they rejoice, And slimy jest applaud with broken voice. Thus dost thou feed their ears, and thus art fed! Base prostitute, thus dost thou gain thy bread? At his own filthy stuff he grins and brays: And gives the sign where he expects their praise. Why have I learn'd say'st thou, if, thus
I choke the noble vigour of my mind? Know, my wild fig-tree, which in rocks is bred, Will split the quarry, and shoot out the head. Fine fraits of learning! old ambitious fool, Dar'st thou apply that adage of the school: As if 'tis nothing worth that lies conceal'd, And science is not science till reveal'd?" Oh, but 'tis brave to be admir'd, to see The crowd, with pointing fingers, cry, That's he That's he whose wondrous poem is become A lecture for the noble youth of Rome ! Who, by their fathers, is at feasts renown'd; And often quoted when the bowls go round. Full gorg'd and flush'd, they wantonly rehearse; And add to wine the luxury of verse.
One, clad in purple, not to lose his time,
FRIEND. None; or what's next to none, but two Eats, and recites some lamentable rhyme:
PERSIUS. ""Tis nothing; I can bear
That paltry scribblers have the public ear: That this vast universal fool, the town, Should cry up Labeo's stuff, and cry me down. They damn themselves; nor will my Muse descend To clap with such, who fools and knaves
Their smiles and censures are to me the same : I care not what they praise, or what they blame. In full assemblies let the crow prevail : I weigh no merit by the common scale. The conscience is the test of every mind;
Seek not thyself, without thyself, to find."
Some senseless Phillis, in a broken hote, Snuffling at nose, and croaking in his throat: Then graciously the mellow audience nod: Is not th' immortal author made a god? Are not his manes blest, such praise to have? Lies not the turf more lightly on his grave? And roses (while his loud applause they sing) Stand ready from his sepulchre to spring?
All these, you cry, but light objections are; Mere malice, and you drive the jest too far. For does there breathe a man, who can reject A general fame, and his own lines neglect? In cedar tablets worthy to appear, That need not fish, or frankincense, to fear? Thou, whom I made the adverse part, to bear,
Be answer'd thus: If I by chance succeed In what I write, (and that's a chance indeed) Know, I am not so stupid, or so hard, Not to feel praise, or fame's deserv'd reward: But this I cannot grant, that thy applause Is my work's ultimate, or only cause. Prudence can ne'er propose so mean a prize; For mark what vanity within it lies.
Like Labeo's Iliads, in whose verse is found Nothing but trifing care, and empty sound: Such little elegies as nobles write,
Who would be poets, in Apollo's spite.
Them and their woeful works the Muse defies: Products of citron-beds, and golden canopies. To give thee all thy due, thou hast the heart To make a supper, with a fine dessert : And to thy thread-bare friend, a cast old suit Thus brib'd, thou thus bespeak'st him, "Tell
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And all thy labours are but loss of time. Thy strutting belly swells, thy paunch is high; Thou writ'st not, but thou pissest poetry.
All authors to their own defects are blind; Hadst thou but, Janus like, a face behind, To see the people, what splay-mouths they make; To mark their fingers, pointed at thy back: Their tongues loll'd out, a foot beyond the pitch, When most a-thirst of an Apulian bitch: But noble scribblers are with flattery fed; For none dare find their faults, who eat their bread. To pass the poets of patrician blood, What is 't the common reader takes for good The verse in fashion is, when numbers flow, Soft without sense, and without spirit slow: So smooth and equal, that no sight can find The rivet, where the polish'd piece was join'd. So even all, with such a steady view, As if he shut one eye to level true. Whether the vulgar vice his satire stings, The people's riots, or the rage of kings, The gentle poet is alike in all;
His reader hopes to rise, and fears no fall.
PRIEND. Hourly we see, some raw pin-feather'd
Attempt to mount, and fights and heroes sing; Who, for false quantities, was whipt at school But t' other day, and breaking grammar-rule, Whose trivial art was never try'd above The brave description of a native grove: Who knows not how to praise the country-store, The feasts, the baskets, nor the fatted boar: Nor paint the flowery fields that paint themselves before.
Where Romulus was bred, and Quintius born, Whose shining ploughshare was in furrows worn, Met by his trembling wife, returning home, And rustically joy'd, as chief of Rome: She wip'd the sweat from the dictator's brow; And o'er his back his robe did rudely throw; The lictors bore in state their lord's triumphant
Some love to hear the fustian poet roar; And some on antiquated authors pore: Rummage for sense; and think those only good Who labour most, and least are understood.
When thou shalt see the blear-ey'd fathers teach Their sons, this harsh and mouldy sort of speech; Or others, new affected ways to try, Of wanton smoothness, female poetry; One would inquire from whence this motley style Did first our Roman purity defile:
For our old dotards cannot keep their seat; But leap and catch at all that's obsolete.
Others, by foolish ostentation led, When call'd before the bar, to save their head, Bring trifling tropes, instead of solid sense : And mind their figures more than their defence. Are pleas'd to hear their thick-skull'd judges cry, Well mov'd, oh finely said, and decently: "Theft" (says th' accuser) "to thy charge I lay, O Pedius;" what does gentle Pedius say? Studious to please the genius of the times, [crimes: With periods, points, and tropes, he slurs his
"He robb'd not, but he borrow'd from the poor; And took but with intention to restore." He lards with flourishes his long harangue; 'Tis fine, say'st thou; what, to be prais'd, and Effeminate Roman, shall such stuff prevail [hang? To tickle thee, and make thee wag thy tail? Say, should a shipwreck'd sailor sing his woe, Wouldst thou be mov'd to pity, or bestow An alms? What's more preposterous than to see A merry beggar? Mirth in misery?
PERSIUS. He seems a trap, for charity, to lay: And cons, by night, his lesson for the day. FRIEND, But to raw numbers, and unfinish'd verse,
Sweet sound is added now, to make it terse: "'Tis tagg'd with rhyme, like Berecynthian Atys, The mid-part chimes with art, which never flat is. The dolphin brave, that cuts the liquid wave, Or he who in his line can chine the long-ribb'd PERSIUS. All this is doggrel stuff. [Apennine." FRIEND. What if I bring
A nobler verse? "Arms and the man I sing." PERSIUS. Why name you Virgil with such fops as these?
He's truly great, and must for ever please : Nor fierce, but awful, in his manly page; Bold in his strength, but sober in his rage.
FRIEND. What poems think you soft? and to be With languishing regards, and bended head? [read PERSIUS. "Their crooked horns the Mimallonian
With blasts inspir'd; and Bassaris who slew The scornful calf, with sword advanc'd on high, Made from his neck his haughty head to fly. And Mænas, when, with ivy bridles bound, She led the spotted lynx, then Evion rung around, Evion from woods and floods repairing echos sound."
Could such rude lines a Roman mouth become, Were any manly greatness left in Rome? Mænas and Atys in the mouth were bred; And never hatch'd within the labouring head: No blood from bitten nails those poems drew: But churn'd, like spittle, from the lips they flew.
FRIEND. 'Tis fustian all; 'tis execrably bad: But if they will be fools, must you be mad? Your satires, let me tell you, are too fierce; The great will never bear so blunt a verse. Their doors are barr'd against a bitter flout: Snarl, if you please, but you shall snarl without. Expect such pay as railing rhymes deserve, Y' are in a very hopeful way to starve.
PERSIUS. Rather than so, uncensur'd let them be; All, all is admirably well, for me. My harmless rhyme shall 'scape the dire disgrace Of common-shores, and every pissing-place. Two painted serpents shall, on high, appear; 'Tis holy ground; you must not urine here. This shall be writ to fright the fry away, Who draw their little baubles, when they play. Yet old Lucilius never fear'd the times, But lash'd the city, and dissected crimes.
Mutius and Lupus both by name he brought; He mouth'd them, and betwixt his grinders caught. Unlike in method, with conceal'd design, Did crafty Horace his low numbers join: And, with a sly insinuating grace, Laugh'd at his friend, and look'd him in the face. Would raise a blush, where secret vice he found; And tickle, while he gently prob'd the wound. With seeming innocence the crowd beguil'd; But made the desperate passes when he smil'd.
Could he do this, and is my Muse control'd By servile awe? Born free, and not be bold? At least, I'll dig a hole within the ground; And to the trusty earth commit the sound: The reeds shall tell you what the poet fears, "King Midas has a snout, and asses' ears." This mean conceit, this darling mystery, Which thou think'st nothing, friend, thou shalt Nor will I change for all the flashy wit, (not buy. That flattering Labeo, in his Iliads, writ. Thou, if there be a thou in this base town Who dares, with angry Eupolis, to frown; He, who, with bold Cratinus, is inspir'd With zeal, and equal indignation fir'd:
Who, at enormous villainy, turns pale, And steers against it with a full blown sail,
Like Aristophanes, let him but smile
On this my honest work, though writ in homely
And if two lines or three in all the vein
Appear less drossy, read those lines again. May they perform their author's just intent, Glow in thy ears, and in thy breast fernent. But from the reading of my book and me, Be far, ye foes of virtuous poverty:
Who fortune's fault upon the poor can thrów; Point at the tatter'd coat, and ragged shoe : Lay Nature's failings to their charge, and jeer The dini weak eye-sight, when the mind is clear, When thou thyself, thus insolent in state, Art but. perhaps, some country magistrate: Whose power extends no farther than to speak Big on the bench, and scauty weights to break.
Hin, also, for my censor I disdain, Who thinks all science, as all virtue, vain; Who counts geometry, and Lumbers, toys; And, with his foot, the sacred dust destroys: Whose pleasure is to see a strumpet tear A Cynic's beard, and lug him by the hair. Such, all the morning, to the pleadings run; But when the business of the day is done, On dice, and drink, and drabs, they spend their
THE SECOND SATIRE OF PERSIUS.
THIS satire contains a most grave and philosopbical argument, concerning prayers and wishes.
Undoubtedly it gave occasion to Juvenal's tenth satire; and both of them had ther original from one of Plato's dialogues, called the Se cond Alcibiades. Our author has induced it with great mystery of art, by taking his rise from the birth-day of his friend; on which oc casions, prayers were made, and sacrifices offered by the native. Persius, commending the purity of his friend's vows, descends to the impious and immoral requests of others. The satire is divided into three parts: the first is the exordium to Macrinus, which the poet confines within the compass of four verses. The second relates to the matter of the prayers and rows, and enumeration of those things, wherein men commonly sinned against right reason, and offended in their requests. The third part consists in showing the repugnances of those prayers and wishes, to those of other men, and inconsistencies with themselves. He shows the original of these vows, and sharply inveighs against them: and lastly, not only corrects the false opinion of mankind concerning them, but gives the true doctrine of all addresses made to Heaven, and how they may be made acceptable to the powers above, in excellent precepts, and more worthy of a Christian than a Heathen.
DEDICATED TO HIS FRIEND PLOTIUS MACRINUS, ON HIS
LET this auspicious morning be exprest With a white stone, distinguish'd from the rest: White as thy fame, and as thy honour clear; And let new joys attend on thy new added year. Indulge thy genius, and o'erflow thy soul, Till thy wit sparkle, like the cheerful bowl. Pray; for thy prayers the test of Heaven will bear; Nor need'st thou take the gods aside, to hear: While others, ev'n the mighty men of Rome, Big swell'd with mischief, to the temples come; And in low murmurs, and with costly smoke, Heaven's help, to prosper their black vows, invoke. So boldly to the gods mankind reveal What from each other they, for shame, conceal. "Give me good fame, ye powers, and make me
Thus much the rogue to public ears will trust: In private then:----" When wilt thou, mighty Jove, My wealthy uncle from this world remove?" Or-" O thou thunderer's son, great Hercules, That once thy bounteous deity would please To guide my rake upon the chiaking sound Of some vast treasure, hidden under ground!"
"O were my pupil fairly knock'd o'th' head; I should possess th' estate, if he were dead! He's so far gone with rickets, and with th' evil, That one small dose will ser.d him to the devil."
"This is my neighbour Nerius's third spouse, Of whom in happy time he rids his house. But my eternal wife!-Grant, Heaven, I may Survive to see the fellow of this day!" Thus, that thou may'st the better bring about Thy wishes, thou art wickedly devout In Tyber ducking thrice, by break of day, To wash th' obscenities of night away. But, prythee, tell ine, ('tis a small request) With what ill thoughts of Jove art thou pasest?
Would'st thou prefer him to some man? Suppose I dipp'd among the worst, and Statius chose? Which of the two would thy wise head declare The trustier tutor to an orphan heir? Or, put it thus:-Unfold to Statius, straight, What to Jove's ear thou didst impart of late: He'll stare, and, "O good Jupiter!" will cry; "Canst thou indulge him in this villainy!" And think'st thou, Jove himself, with patience then Can hear a prayer condemn'd by wicked men ? That, void of care, he lolls supine in state, And leaves his business to be done by fate? Because his thunder splits some burley-tree, And is not darted at thy house and thee? Or that his vengeance falls not at the time, Just at the perpetration of thy crime, And makes thee a sad object of our eyes, Fit for Ergenna's prayer and sacrifice? What well-fed offering to appease the god, What powerful present to procure a nod, Hast thou in store? What bribe has thou prepar'd, To pull him, thus unpunish'd, by the beard?
Our superstitions with our life begin : Th' obscene old grandam, or the next of kin, The new-born infant from the cradle takes, And first of spittle a lustration makes: Then in the spawl her middle-finger dips, Anoints the temples, forehead, and the lips, Pretending force of magic to prevent, By virtue of her nasty excrement.
Then dandles him, with many a mutter'd prayer That Heaven would make him some rich miser's Lucky to ladies, and in time a king; [heir, Which to ensure, she adds a length of navel-string. But no fond nurse is fit to make a prayer: And Jove, if Jove be wise, will never hear; Not though she prays in white, with lifted hands: A body made of brass the crone demands For her lov'd nursling, strung with nerves of wire, Tough to the last, and with no toil to tire: Unconscionable vows, which, when we use, We teach the gods, in reason, to refuse. Suppose they were indulgent to thy wish: Yet the fat entrails, in the spacious dish, Would stop the grant: the very over-care, And nauseous pomp, would hinder half the prayer. Thou hop'st, with sacrifice of oxen slain, To compass wealth, and bribe the god of gain, To give thee flocks and herds, with large increase; Fool! to expect them from a bullock's grease! And think'st that, when the fatten'd flames aspire, Thou seest th' accomplishment of thy desire!
Now, now, my bearded harvest gilds the plain, The scanty folds can scarce my sheep contain, And showers of gold come pouring in amain!" Thus dreams the wretch, and vainly thus dreams on, Till his lank purse declares his money gone.
Should I present them with rare figur'd plate, Or gold as rich in workmanship as weight; O how thy rising heart would throb and beat, And thy left side, with trembling pleasure, sweat! Thou measur'st by thyself the powers divine; Thy gods are burnish'd gold, and silver is their
Thy puny godlings of inferior race, Whose humble statues are content with brass, Should some of these, in visions purg'd from phlegm, Foretel events, or in a morning dream; Ev'n those thou would'st in veneration hold; And, if not faces, give them beards of gold.
The priests in temples, now, no longer care For Saturn's brass, or Numa's earthern ware; Or vestal urns, in each religious rite: This wicked gold has put them all to flight. O souls, in whom no heavenly fire is found, Fat minds, and ever groveling on the ground! We bring our manners to the blest abodes, And think what pleases us must please the gods. Of oil and cassia one th' ingredients takes, And, of the mixture, a rich ointment makes : Another finds the way to dye in grain; And makes Calabrian wool receive the Tyrian stain; Or from the shells their orient treasure takes, Or, for their golden ore, in rivers rakes; Then melts the mass: all these are vanities! Yet still some profit from their pains may rise: But tell me, priest, if I may be so bold, What are the gods the better for this gold ? The wretch that offers from his wealthy store These presents, bribes the powers to give him more : As maids to Venus offer baby-toys,
To bless the marriage-bed with girls and boys. But let us for the gods a gift prepare, Which the great man's great charges cannot bear : A soul, where laws both human and divine, In practice more than speculation shine: A genuine virtue, of a vigorous kind, Pure in the last recesses of the mind: When with such offerings to the gods I come, A cake, thus given, is worth a hecatomb.
THE THIRD SATIRE OP PERSIUS.
Our author has made two satires concerning study; the first and the third the first related to men; this to young students, whom he desired to be educated in the stoic philosophy: he himself sustains the person of the master, or preceptor, in this admirable satire; where he upbraids the youth of sloth, and negligence in learning. Yet he begins with one scholar reproaching his fellow-students with late rising to their books. After which he takes upon him the other part of the teacher. And addressing himself parti cularly to young noblemen, tells them, that by reason of their high birth, and the great possessions of their fathers, they are careless of adorning their minds with precepts of moral philosophy: and withal, inculcates to them the miseries which will attend them in the whole course of their life, if they do not apply themselves betimes to the knowledge of virtue, and the end of their creation, which he pathetically insinuates to them. The title of this satire, in some ancient manuscript, was the Reproach of Idleness; though in others of the scholiast it is inscribed, Against the Luxury and Vices of the Rich. In both of which the intention of the poet is pursued; but principally in the former.
[I remember I translated this satire, when I was a king's scholar at Westminster-school, for a Thursday-night's exercise; and believe that it,
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