the populace see right; sometimes they are wrong. If they admire and extol the ancient poets so as to prefer nothing before, to compare nothing with them, they err; if they think and allow that they express some things in an obsolete, most in a stiff, many in a careless manner; they both think sensibly, and agree with me, and determine with the assent of Jove himself. Not that I bear an ill-will against Livy’s epics, and would doom them to destruction, which I remember the severe Orbilius taught me when a boy; but they should seem correct, beautiful, and very little short of perfect, this I wonder at: among which if by chance a bright expression shines forth, and if one line or two [happen to be] somewhat terse and musical, this unreasonably carries off and sells the whole poem. I am disgusted that any thing should be found fault with, not because it is a lumpish composition or inelegant, but because it is modern; and that not a favorable allowance, but honor and rewards[1] are demanded for the old writers. Should I scruple, whether or not Atta’s drama trod the saffron and flowers[2] in a proper manner, almost all the fathers would cry out that modesty was lost; since I attempted to find fault with those pieces which the pathetic Æsopus,[3] which the skillful Roscius acted: either because they esteem nothing right, but what has pleased themselves; or because they think it disgraceful to submit to their juniors, and to confess, now they are old, that what they learned when young is deserving only to be destroyed. Now he who extols Numa’s
- ↑ Honorem et præmia. The rewards and honors which this disputant demands for his favorite ancients, were, having their works placed, and their statues erected, in the library of Apollo. Dac.
- ↑ Perfumed waters were scattered through the Roman theaters, and the stage was covered with flowers, to which Horace pleasantly alludes, when he supposes the plays of Atta limping over the stage like their lame author. Titus Quintius had the surname of Atta given him, which signifies a man who walks on tip-toe. We are obliged to Scaliger for discovering the beauty of this passage. Fran.
- ↑ Æsopus excelled in tragedy, from whence Horace calls him gravis, pathetic. Roscius had a lively, natural, familiar manner of speaking, proper for comedy. He composed a book upon theatrical eloquence, in which he attempted to prove, that any sentiment might be as variously expressed by action, as by the power of language. Cicero gives him this amiable character: “he was so excellent an actor, that he alone seemed worthy to appear upon a stage; but he was a man of so much probity that he alone should never have appeared there.” Fran.
