And, while we dance through breathing bowers, In bowls he makes my senses swim, Till the gale breathes of nought but him! That none but social spirits know, When youthful revellers, round the bowl, Though the wane of age is mine, ODE LII. ' AWAY, away, you men of rules! My soul upon the goblet's brim; I've time for nought but pleasure now. At yonder fountain's gelid flow; I'll quaff, my boy, and calmly sink This soul to slumber as I drink! Soon, too soon, my jocund slave, Is it, that wintry time has strew'd my brow, See, in yonder flowery braid, Cull'd for thee, my blushing maid!] In the same manner that Anacreon pleads for the whiteness of his locks, from the beauty of the colour in garlands, a shepherd, in Theocritus, endeavours to recommend his black hair: Και το τον μελαν εςι, και ά γραπτα ύακινθος This is doubtless the work of a more modern poet than Anacreon, for at the period when he lived rhetoricians were not known.”—Dɛ GEN. Though the antiquity of this ode is confirmed by the Vatican manuscript, I am very much inclined to agree in this argument against its authenticity: for, though the dawnings of rhetoric might already have appeared, the first who gave it any celebrity was Corax of Syracuse, and he flourished in the century after Anacreon. When youthful revellers, round the bowl, Dilating, mingle soul with soul!] Subjoined to Gail's edition of Anacreon, there are some curious letters upon the 2501 of the ancients, which appeared in the French Journals. At the opening of the Odeon, in Paris, the managers of the spectacle requested ProOur poet anticipated the ideas of Epicurus, in his aversion to the fessor Gail to give them some uncommon name for the fêtes of this institution. He suggested the word Thiase, which was adopted; a panzplot peuyere, said the philosopher of labours of learning, as well as his devotion to voluptuousness.but the literati of Paris questioned the propriety of it, and addressed their criticisms to Gail, through the medium of the public prints. Two or three of the letters he has inserted in his edition, and they have elicited from him some learned research on the subject. Alberti has imitated this ode; and Capilupus, in the following epigram, has given a version of it: Cur, Lalage, mea vita, meos contemnis amores? No fugias, sint sparsa licet mea tempora canis, Oh! why repel my soul's impassion'd vow, the garden in a letter to Pythocles. Teach me this, and let me twine My arms around the nymph divine ! By χρυσης Αφροδίτης here, I understand some beautiful girl; in the same manner that Auxtos is often used for wine. Golden is frequently an epithet of beauty. Thus in Virgil, Venus aurea; and in Propertius, Cynthia aurea. Tibullus, however, calls an old woman golden.. The translation d'Autori Anonimi, as usual, wantons on this passage of Anacreon: E m' insegni con più rare Il bel cinto d'onestade. And there's an end-for ah! you know, They drink but little wine below! ODE LIII. WHEN I behold the festive train And wings me lightly through the dance. Cull the flower and twine the braid; snows; Burn upon my brow of Bid the blush of summer's rose It Burn upon my brow of snows, etc.] Licetus, in his Hieroglyphica, quoting two of our poet's odes, where he calls for garlands, remarks, Constat igitur floreas coronas poetis et potantibus in symposio convenire, non autem sapientibus et philosophiam affectantibus. appears that wreaths of flowers were adapted for poets and revellers at banquets, but by no means became those who had pretensions 10 wisdom and philosophy. On this principle, in bis 15ad chapter, he discovers a refinement in Virgil, describing the garland of the poet Silenus as fallen off; which distinguishes, he thinks, the divine intoxication of Silenus from that of common drunkards, who always wear their crowns while they drink. This, indeed, is the « labor ineptiarum of commentators. He still can kiss the goblet's brim, etc.] Wine is prescribed by Galen as an excellent medicine for old men: « Quod frigidos et humoribus expletos calefaciat, etc.; but Nature was Anacreon's phy sician. There is a proverb in Eriphus, as quoted by Athenaeus, which says that wine makes an old man dance, whether he will or not.. Λόγος ες αρχαιος, ου κακως εχων, This ode is written upon a picture which represented the rape of Europa. Madame Dacier. It may perhaps be considered as a description of one of those coins which the Sidonians struck off in honour of Europa, representing a How fondly blest he seems to bear ODE LV.' WHILE we invoke the wreathed spring, woman carried across the sea by a bull. Thus Natalis Comes, lib. viii, cap. 23. Sidonii numismata cum fœmina tauri dorso insidente ac mare transfretante, cuderunt in ejus honorem. In the little treatise upon the goddess of Syria, attributed very falsely to Lucian, there is mention of this coin, and of a temple dedicated by the Sidonians to Astarte, whom some, it appears, confounded with Europa. Moschus has written a very beautiful idyl on the story of Europa. No: he descends from climes above, He looks the God, he breathes of Jove.] Thus Moschus: Κρυψε Θεόν και τρεψε δέμας· και γινετο ταύρος. The God forgot himself, his heaven, for love, 1 This ode is a brilliant panegyric on the rose. (says Barnes) has produced nothing more beautiful.» From the idea of peculiar excellence which the ancients attached to this flower, arose a pretty proverbial expression, used by Aristophanes, according to Suidas, pro petprxas, You have spoken roses, a phrase somewhat similar to the dire des fleurettes of the French. In the same idea of excellence originated, I doubt not, a very curious application of the word oo, for which the inquisitive reader may consult Gaulminus upon the epithalamium of our poet, where it is introduced in the romance of Theodorus. Muretus, in one of his elegies, calls his mistress his rose. Jam te igitur rursus teneo, formosula, jam te Now I again embrace thee, dearest, Eleg. 8. This, like most of the terms of endearment in the modern Latin poets, is taken from Plautus; they were vulgar and colloquial in his time, and they are among the elegancies of the modern Latinists. Passeratius alludes to the ode before us, in the beginning of his poem on the Rose: Carmine digna rosa est; vellem caneretur ut illam Resplendent rose to thee we'll sing.] I have passed over the line συν εταιρει αύξει μέλπην; it is corrupt in this original reading, and has been very little improved by the annotators. I should suppose it to be an interpolation, if it were not for a line which occurs afterwards: spe on pusly deywper. The rose is warm Dione's bliss, etc.] Belleau, in a note upon an old French poet, quoting the original here 2p soolotov s'atuppa, translates it, comme les délices et mignardises de Vénus. Oft has the poet's magic tongue Oft has the poet's magic tongue, The rose's fair luxuriance sung, etc.] The following is a fragment of the Lesbian poetess. It is cited in the romance of Achilles Tatius, who appears to have resolved the numbers into prose. Ev Tots av θεσιν ηθελεν ὁ Ζευς επιθείναι βασιλέα, το ροδον αν των ανθέων εβασιλευει γης εςι κόσμος, φυτων αγλαίσμα, οφθαλμος ανθέων, λειμώνος ερύθημα, κάλλος ας ράπτον. Ερωτος πνει, Αφροδίτην προξενει, ευει δεσι φύλλοις κομα, ευκίνητοις πεταλοις τρυφα το πεταλον το Ζέφυρο γελα. If Jove would give the leafy Lowers Till, glowing with the wanton's play, When morning paints the orient skies, Her fingers burn with roscate dyes, etc.] In the original here, he enumerates the many epithets of beauty, borrowed from roses, which were used by the poets, παρά των σοφών. We see that poets were dignified in Greece with the title of sages; even the careless Anacreon, who lived but for love and voluptuousness, was called by Plato the wise Anacreon. Fuit hæc sapientia quondam. Preserves the cold inurned clay, etc.] He here alludes to the use of the rose in embalming; and, perhaps (as Barnes thinks), to the rosy unguent with which Venus anointed the corpse of Hector. Homer's Iliad, . It may likewise regard the ancient practice of putting garlands of roses on the dead, as in Statius, Theb. lib. x, 782. hi sertis, hi veris honore soluto Accumulant artus patriaque in sede reponunt Where veris honor, though it mean every kind of flowers, may And when, at length, in pale decline, Oh! whenee could such a plant have sprung? The sweetly orient buds they dyed, seem more particularly to refer to the rose, which our poet, in another ode, calls Expos μednya. We read, in the Hieroglyphics of Pierius, lib. Iv, that some of the ancients used to order, in their wills, that roses should be annually scattered on their tombs; and he has adduced some sepulchral inscriptions to this purpose. And mocks the vestige of decay.] When he says that this flower prevails over time itself, he still alludes to its efficacy in embalment (tenera poneret ossa rosa. Propert. lib. i, eleg. 17), or perhaps to the subsequent idea of its fragrance surviving its beauty; for he can scarcely mean to praise for duration the « nimium breves fores » of the rose. Philostratus compares this flower with love, and says that they both defy the influence of time; χρονον δε ουτε Ερως, OUTE poox OLDEY. Unfortunately the similitude lies, not in their duration, but their transience. Sweet as in youth, its balmy breath Diffuses odour c'en in death.] Thus Caspar Barlæus, in his Ritus Nuptiarum: Ambrosium late rosa tunc quoque spargit odorem, Nor then the rose its odour loses, When all its flushing beauties die; With nectar drops, a ruby tide, The sweetly orient buds they dyed, etc.] The author of the Pervigilium Veneris (a poem attributed to Catullus, the style of which appears to me to have all the laboured luxuriance of a much later period) ascribes the tincture of the rose to the blood from the wound of Adonis: rosa Fuse aprino de cruore according to the emendation of Lipsius. In the following epigram this hue is differently accounted for: Illa quidem studiosa suum defendere Adonim, While the enamour'd queen of joy On whom the jealous war-god rushes; And while the wound with crimson flows, The snowy flow'ret feels her blood, and blushes! ODE LVI. HE, who instructs the youthful crew The heavenly stream shall mantling flow, No youth shall then be wan or weak, ODE LVII. AND whose immortal hand could shed 1. Compare with this elegant ode the verses of Cz, lib. i, die Weinlese. Degen. This appears to be one of the hymns which were sung at the anniversary festival of the vintage; one of the ɛmiantot vot, as our poet himself terms them in the fifty-ninth ode. We cannot belp feeling a peculiar veneration for these relics of the religion of antiquity. Horace may be supposed to have written the nineteenth ode of his second book, and the twenty-fifth of the third, for some bacchanalian celebration of this kind. Which, sparkling in the cup of mirth. Illuminate the sons of earth!] In the original TOTOY ASOVO XIutswr. Madame Dacier thinks that the poet here had the nepenthe of Homer in his mind. Odyssey, lib. iv. This nepenthe was a something of exquisite charm, infused by Helen into the wine of her guests, which bad the power of dispelling every anxiety. A French writer, with very elegant gallantry, conjectures that this spell, which made the bowl so beguiling, was the charm of Helen's conversation. See de Meré, quoted by Bayle, art. Helène. This ode is a very animated description of a picture of Venus on a discus, which represented the goddess in her first emergence from the waves. About two centuries after our poet wrote, the pencil of the artist Apelles embellished this subject, in bis famous painting of the Venus Anadyomené, the model of which, as Pliny informs us. was the beautiful Campaspe, given to him by Alexander; though. according to Natalis Comes, lib. vii, cap. 16, it was Phryne who sat to Apelles for the face and breast of this Venus. There are a few blemishes in the reading of the ode before us, which have influenced Faber, Heyne, Brunck, etc. to denounce the whole poem as spurious. Non ego paucis offendar maculis. I think it is beautiful enough to be authentic. And whose immortal hand could shed Upon this disk the ocean's bed?] The abruptness of apa Tls ToPEUGE TROYTOY, is finely expressive of sudden admiration, and is one of those beauties which we cannot but admire in their source, though, by frequent imitation, they are now become languid and impressive. Floating along the silvery sea Within the lucid billows veil'd. ODE LVIII. ‹ WHEN gold, as fleet as Zephyr's pinion, And all those sacred scenes of love, Where only hallow'd eyes may rove, etc.] The picture here has all the delicate character of the semi-reducta Venus, and is the sweetest emblem of what the poetry of passion ought to be,-glowing but through a veil, and stealing upon the heart from concealment. Few of the ancients have attained this modesty of description, which is like the golden cloud that hung over Jupiter and Juno, impervious to every beam but that of fancy. Her bosom like the humid rose, etc.] 'Pode (says an anonymous annotator) is a whimsical epithet for the bosom. Neither Catullus nor Gray have been of his opinion. The former has the expression, En bic in roseis latet papillis. And the latter, Lo where the rosy-bosom'd hours, etc. Crottus, a modern Latinist, might indeed be censured for too vague an use of the epithet « rosy, when he applies it to the eyes: • eroseis oculis.» the same deity with Jocus among the Romans. Aurelius Augurellus young Desire, etc.] In the original lupos, who was bas a poem beginning Invitat olim Bacchus ad cœnam suos Which Parnell has closely imitated: Gay Bacchus, liking Estcourt's wine, I have followed Barnes's arrangement of this ode, it deviates somewhat from the Vatican MS., but it appeared to me the more natural order. When goid, as fleet as Zephyr's pinton, Escapes like any faithless minion, etc.). In the original O opamatas o xpucos. There is a kind of pun in these words, as And flies me (as he flies me ever), For who would court his direst foe? And cast them to the vagrant airs. From love and song, perhaps for ever! But rove not near the bard again; Madame Dacier has already remarked; for Chrysos, which signifies gold, was also a frequent name for a slave. In one of Lucian's dialogues, there is, I think, a similar play upon the word, where the followers of Chrysippus are called golden tishes. The puns of the ancients are, in general, even more vapid than our own; some of the best are those recorded of Diogenes. And flies me (as he flies me ever), etc.] Aɛtd, at μe pevyel. This grace of iteration has already been taken notice of. Though sometimes merely a playful beauty, it is peculiarly expressive of impassioned sentiment, and we may easily believe that it was one of the many sources of that energetic sensibility which breathed through the style of Sappho. See Gyrald. Vet. Poet. Dial. 9. It will not be said that this is a mechanical ornament by any one who can feel its charm in these lines of Catullus, where he complains of the infidelity of bis mistress, Lesbia. Coli, Lesbia nostra, Lesbia illa, Illa Lesbia, quam Catullus unam, Plus quam se atque suos amavit omnes, Si sic omnia dixisset! but the rest does not bear citation. They tainted all his bowl of blisses, His bland desires and hallow'd kisses.] Original: Φιληματων δε κείνων, Παθών κύπελλα κίρνης. Horace has Desiderique temperare poculum, not figuratively, however, like Anacreon, but importing the love-philtres of the witches. By cups of kisses our poet may allude to a favourite gallantry among the ancients, of drinking when the lips of their mis tresses had touched the brim: Or leave a kiss within the cup, And I'll not ask for wine, as in Ben Jonson's translation from Philostratus; and Lucian has a conceit upon the same idea, 12 21 75 apa xai pigs, that you may at once both drink and kiss." SABLED by the solar beam, The virgin wakes, the glowing boy 1 The title Επιληνιος ύμνος, which Barnes has given to this ode, is by no means appropriate. We have already had one of those hymns (ode 56), but this is a description of the vintage; and the title Ets oto, which it bears in the Vatican MS., is more correct than any that have been suggested. Degen, in the true spirit of literary scepticism, doubts that this ode is genuine, without assigning any reason for such a suspicion. «Non amo te, Sabidi, nec possam dicere quare; but this is far from satisfactory criticism. Swears that the herbage Heaven had spread, as sacred as the nuptial bed, etc.] The original here has been variously interpreted. Some, in their zeal for our author's purity, have supposed that the youth only persuades her to a premature marriage; others understand from the words podoτiv yapov yevecht, that be seduces her to a violation of the nuptial vow. The turn which I have given it is somewhat like the sentiment of Heloisa, conjugio, libertatem vincolo præferre. (See her original Letters.) The Italian translations bave almost all wantoned upon this description: but that of Marchetti is indeed nimium lubricus aspici." amorem |