62
.NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. xn. JULY 25, 1903.
la Nuit, Songes Eomantiques, traduites de
1'Esclavon du Comte Maxime Odin. Par Ch.
Nodier. Paris, Ponthieu, 1821." On the
half-title is the inscription : "S. T. Coleridge,
Esq re . From T. C. Grattan" a somewhat
remarkable conjunction of names. Appa-
rently these fantastic imaginings of Nodier*
did not appeal to Coleridge ; yet it would
have been interesting to have his opinion on
- Le Bey Spalatin ' and ' La Femme d'Asan.'
WILLIAM E. A. AXON. Manchester.
BURTON'S 'ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY.'
(See 9 th S. xi. 181, 222, 263, 322, 441 ; xii. 2.)
THERE is a noticeable slip on p. 29 of vol. i. in Shilleto's edition. Burton, after complain- ing that "Any scurrile pamphlet is welcome
to our mercenary Stationers in English
but in Latin they will not deal," adds " which is one of the reasons Nicholas Car, in his oration of the paucity of English writers, gives, that so many flourishing wits are smothered in oblivion, lie dead and buried in this our nation." Shilleto makes the author's marginal note (1) state that this oration was printed in 1676 !
In Cooper's 'AthenseCantabrigienses' (vol. i. p. 263 ; cf. Mr. Thompson Cooper's life of Nicholas Carr in the 'D.N.B.') is a list of Carr's works, including ' De Scriptorum Britannicprura paucitate, et studiorum im- pedimentis oratio/ London, 8vo, 1576, edited by Tho. Hatcher.
At first sight Shilleto's 1676 might be regarded as a misprint pure and simple ; but it is at least a singular coincidence that the date is misprinted in the sixth edition of the 'Anatomy' (p. 11, note d), where it appears as 1976.
I cannot but surmise. Forgive me, friend,
If the conjecture 'a rash, I cannot but
Surmise
that somebody hastily assumed 1976 to be an error for 1676. Burton continues : "Another main fault is, that I have not revised the copy, and amended the style, which now flows remissly," &c. ; and there is but too much evidence in these volumes of "remissness" on the part of Burton's modern editor, or who- ever was responsible for " revising the copy." Vol. ii. p. 231, 1. 7 (Part. II. sect. iii. mem. vii.; p. 357, 1. 16 from foot, in 6th edit.), "humanum est errare." Shilleto's note is "An Cic. Phil, xii. ii. 5? Cujusvis est errare." [Cuiusvis hominis est errare : nullius nisi insipientis in errore perseverare.J See, however, the inter-
[* Afterwards included in the same volume with
- Trilby,' * Les Tristes,' and ' H&ene Gillet.']
esting article in Biichmann's ' Gefliigelte
Worte' (20th ed., pp. 450, 451), where the
thought is quoted in the words of various
writers, the earliest being Theognis, and the
modern form "errare humanum est" derived
from St. Jerome's "errasse humanum est"
[" quia et errasse humanum est et confiteri
errorem, prudentis"], 'Epist.,' Ivii. 12. It is
instructive to compare the more fiery St. Au-
gustine's version which Biichmann cites,
"Humanum fuit errare, diabolicum est, per
animositatem in errore manere " (' Sermones,'
clxiv. 14).
Vol. ii. p. 235, n. 20 (Part, sect., and mem. as before ; p. 360, note k, in 6th edit.), " Bis dat qui cito dat" (by quoting which John Jobling, M.R.C.S., gained the reputation of being a "classical scholar"). Shilleto adds the reference "Alciatus, 'Emblemata,'No. 162." The emblem is that of the three Graces, and the words occur in lines 9 and 10:
Addita cur nuper pedibus talaria ? bis dat
Qui cito dat. Minimi gratia tarda pretii est. (P. 241 in the edition in Latin and French published at Paris, 1574.)
Here again Biichmann may be referred to with advantage. After quoting (p. 400) the line of Publilius Syrus (to whom Shilleto, it should be noted, persists in giving the incor- rect name of " Publius "),
Inopi beneficium bis dat qui dat celeriter (245), he traces the form '* Bis dat," &c., to Erasmus. 'Adagia,' I. viii. 91 "Memini, nisi fallpr, apud Senecam alicubi legere : bis dat qui cito dat" observing that the saying is not found in Seneca. [There is a somewhat similar thought in Seneca's 'De Beneficiis,' II. i. 1, " Sic demus, quomodo vellemus accipere. Ante omnia libenter, cito, sine ulla dubitatione"; and 3, " Gratissima sunt beneficia parata, facilia, pccurrentia, ubi nulla rnora fuit nisi in accipientis verecundia."]
Several editions of Erasmus's l Adagia ' had been published when Alciatus's * Emblemata ' first appeared, but. as I write in a state that has been appropriately called "the Paradise of the working man and the Sahara of scholars," the libraries in which contain few older books, I am unable at this moment to prove that Erasmus used the words before Alciatus.
Vol. iii. p..24, 1. 9 from foot (Part. III. sect. i. mem. ii. subs, ii.), " Ovid in [A. B. S. inserts " his "] Ibis, Archilocus himself, was not so bitter." This is an instructive example of the way the text has been handled in this edition. Shilleto's proposed insertion of "his" is due to the fact that he has failed in the first instance to reproduce correctly the read- ing of ed. 6, which has (p. 421, 1. 10) " Ovid, in Ibin, Archilocus himself was not so bitter"
