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Shorey's Odes and Epodes of Horace Horace: Odes and Epodes, edited with Introduction and Notes by Paul Shorey, Ph.D., Professor in the University of Chicago. Sanborn & Co., Boston, U.S.A. 1898. Pp. xxxvii, 487.

J. P. Postgate

The Classical Review / Volume 14 / Issue 04 / May 1900, pp 229 - 232 DOI: 10.1017/S0009840X0008255X, Published online: 27 October 2009

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0009840X0008255X

How to cite this article: J. P. Postgate (1900). Review of Colin Kidd 'The forging of races: race and scripture in the Protestant Atlantic world, 1600–2000' The Classical Review, 14, pp 229-232 doi:10.1017/ S0009840X0008255X

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Downloaded from http://journals.cambridge.org/CAR, IP address: 128.122.253.212 on 08 May 2015 THE CLASSICAL EEVIEW. 229 by Dr. Peterson's notes on this admirable was caught, when it was Diogenes who was speech to administer it. (Probably Cicero's story singula dum capti circumvectamur amore is intentionally confused.) that we have already exceeded the bounds of One last point. In § 163 Ambivium (T.) a review. Beference may be made to the is preferred to A. Bivium (SMS). The true adoption of in eo loco § 65, the attempt to reading is, I believe, Abivium which is found supply the lacuna in § 103 (which, however, in a Brit. Mus. cod. (Burn 159) : and we does nothing more than others to mark the have here a pun like those in § 72. This is transition from the first trial of Fidiculanius a copo de via Latina, who has been making Falcula to the second), the defence of accusavit himself disagreeable : ' if he invites us into ut cum in § 150, of at heres est 0. in § 165, his hostelry we shall give him such a the excision, in § 173 (the poisoning reception that he will be sorry he has gone passage), of faciliusne potuit quam in out of his way'; the words de via (Latina) poculo as mere ' index-words' from the decessisse contain a play upon the name margin. The last is not a convincing Abivius (abire via). solution of a passage which Lambinus des- This Edition makes a distinct contribution paired of emending : but it may point the to the solution of the difficulties of the pro way to a remedy ; one might prefer to keep Cluentio: which is high praise in the case of the triple question (faciliusne...latius... a speech for which so much had already been celerius...) and to throw out facilius fallerein done by the successive labours of scholars. pane si esset animadversum quam in poculo, It can hardly be regarded as the last word which is really self-contradictory. In § 192 an of the higher scholarship on this speech. The emendation of an equally unsatisfactory interpretation of the pro Cluentio is one of passage is suggested which merijbs attention. those classical tasks, such as the translation The Introduction gives a useful summary of the Odes of Horace, which have a peculiar of the facts of the iudicium Iunianum and attraction for scholars and provide a touch- the praeiudicia of which so much is made by stone of criticism. But we may hope that the orator. The technical question relating Principal Peterson will address himself next to the lex Cornelia de sicariis is fully to some res integra. There are speeches of discussed ; the value of Cicero's argument is Cicero which still await an editor. examined. The Scamander incident is set in a clearer light: the meaning of § 47 The only misprints which I have noticed pecunia obsignata quae . ob earn rem (' for are as follows: p. xli., middle, for § 149 the deed') is determined, though adferre read § 145; p. xlii. for -egrinus read (§ 53) in the sense ' to administer' might egimus; p. 28 cr. n., for 6 read 9; p. 34 have been illustrated (e.g. Cael. § 31); nor cr. n. on 18, correct thus 'alia most codd.; is it explained why Scamander had the aliqua some edd.' (2 M have aliqua); p. 249 poison on him as well as the money when he middle, read pane for pace. W. YOEKB FAUSSET.

SHOEEY'S ODES AND EPODES OF HORACE.

Horace: Odes and Epodes, edited with Intro- of the students' needs it may be truly said duction and Notes by PAUL SHOBET, to have realized the promise of its motto, Ph.D., Professor in the University of ov TTOXX' akka iroXv. The distinguishing Chicago. Sanborn & Co., Boston, U.S.A. feature of the book is its ' literary' charac- 1898. Pp. xxxvii, 487. ter. Dr. Shorey in his preface does not deprecate this description j only by means of THE friend of American freedom will wel- an illustration from the French, which I must come in this edition one of the fast accumu- transcribe for the delectation of readers of lating proofs that the trans-Atlantic domin- the Classical Review who do not know it ation of Berlin and Gottingen is on the already, he explains in what sense his decline. In its practical and its literary edition is not a literary one. character it bears the unmistakable impress of the Anglo-Saxon genius. It forms part Ease autem a Tentdo gemini tranquiUa per alta. Ecee autem I Les voila, ce sont eux! A Tenedo ; of a series entitled the Students' Series of c'est de Tenedos qu'ils arrivent; on les apercoit de Latin Classics, and judged from the standard loin ; gemini ; ila sont deux ; Us foment un couple! 230 THE CLASSICAL REVIEW. Ambo serait faible; mate gemini! TranquUla per his thoughts and diction from modern Eng- alta; c'est la haute mer; elle est tranquille, et les lish and foreign poets. I do not wish to deux monstres s'avancent. Quel tableau ! * suggest that ancient illustrations are absent From these scenic methods the interpreta- or in defect. There is an ample store of tion of Dr. Shorey is far removed. He has these also; but they do not constitute so a fine ear and a delicate touch; and he distinguishing a feature in the book. understands how in matters exegetical the It is hard here to say whether we should half is often far better than the whole. admire more the stores of elegant learning His lightness of hand is perhaps best shown from which the editor has drawn or the by quotation. Two successive notes, on iii. judgment with which he has made his 3. 38 and 40, are ' exsules: slightly spiteful' selection. The result is beyond all question. [it will be remembered Juno is the speaker] Dr. Shorey's book cannot fail to stimulate ' and with beati a faint oxymoron'—' busto: in its every reader a fuller, a deeper and a Vergil's iacet ingens litore truncus, etc. (Aen. more vivid appreciation of the art and 2. 557) was not yet published to preoccupy poetry of Horace. So much do I feel this the imagination.' Here Dr. Shorey's brevity that I assume the role of censor with con- is conspicuous: but he does not show to siderable reluctance; but the ungracious less advantage where he is fuller. And he task cannot be altogether declined. is fuller where, for example, ample illustra- The study of all classics, we know, has tion of Horace's diction or style is the true two main branches, criticism and exposition. economy. Witness his excellent note on With neither can it dispense any more than i. 32. 9 where he shows in elucidation of a Euclid with his problems or his theorems; general discussion in the preface that the though the Q.E.F. of the unbridled critic and single word udus represents in Horace as the Q.E.D. of the unabashed interpreter have many as eight Greek words, aXucAiMrros, often produced the illusion that it can. Stepds, /Se/Spey/tei/os, eAtoS^s, vypos, evvSpos, Every man (the exceptions may for present ev8pos, ijepouq. Notes of this kind are nopurposet s be neglected) leans naturally merely scholarly : they breed scholarship. in the one direction or the other; the The literary taste and feeling displayed inclination of Dr. Shorey (he would pre- throughout this commentary make its occa- sumably admit it himself, see Pref. p. vii), sional lapses into the tricks of English is to exposition. We do not mean that he speech, of which American scholars have presents an impervious carapace to criti- not as yet divested themselves, all the more cal arguments. He discriminates between irritating. E.g. ' For knocking with foot, cf. the alternatives which dissension in the Plaut. Most. 444; Oallim. Hym. Apott. 3. manuscripts offers; and usually his election Observe alliteration.' p. 159. We might is right. Occasionally even where they are parody Dr. Shorey on i. 32. 9 and say unanimous he leaves them and adopts a con- 'Note American poverty of articles.' On jecture ; sometimes a mistaken one as at III. 3. 12 we read ' we may choose between Epodes v. 87 where he accepts] Haupt's the "purple light" of youth, the halo of maga non. But his heart is in the other apotheosis, and a "purple-stained mouth camp : and if the student desires to under- from a beaker full of the true, the blushful stand the real critical issues in a difficult Hippocrene"' (p. 312). 'Blushful Hippc- and disputed passage, he must go elsewhere : crene,' ye Muses! These may be small he will not get enlightenment from Dr. matters, it is true; but they are as sand in Shorey. And here I must pause to touch the eye. upon a very subtle danger to criticism which Other English editions of Horace have the free use of modern parallels involves. shown literary tact and insight perhaps as A quotation from a modern writer brings great as Dr. Shorey's, though they have not home to the reader's mind the thought equalled his brevity. But in another fea- which the citer desires to suggest with a ture of the ' literary' edition he is without a force and vividness that no ancient quota- rival. It was his aim to stimulate the tion can match. Such an appeal is apt to student's appreciation of the Odes by a some- sweep reason from her feet while the mind what fuller illustration than 'is generally forgets that the modern may have mis- given of Horace's thought, sentiment and understood or misrepresented the ancient poetic imagery.' This aim he has attained and that at any rate he is a modern by means of copious quotations from English after all. metrical versions and ample illustration of I would purposely illustrate the first possibility by two instances which have 1 M. Sarcey, Souvenirs de Jeunesse, p. 180. no special bearing upon contested points of THE CLASSICAL REVIEW. 331 Horatian interpretation. The volume of or three years old. Then are quoted Longfellow's poems entitled Ultima Thule Rossetti Love's Nocturne ' When in groves contains a poem upon Jugurtha which a the gracile spring | Trembles ': Swinburne, well known poet and critic of poetry, Mr. Atalanta, ' When the hounds of spring are E. "W. Gosse, singled out when the book on winter's traces | The mother of months first appeared for high commendation. It in meadow or plain | Fills the shadows and runs as follows : windy places | With lisp of leaves (his italics) and ripple of rain.' And for aduen- How cold are thy baths, Apollo ! tus is quoted Milton's ' Far off his coming Cried the African monarch, the splendid, shone.' And in all this the vital issues are As down to his death in the hollow, Dark dungeons of Rome he descended, never even touched ; that, bold and beautiful Uncrowned, unthroned, unattended. as the image may be, the boldness and How cold are thy baths, Apollo ! beauty is not that of ancient poetry while its How cold are thy baths, Apollo ! indirectness and irrelevance is as alien to the Cried the poet, unknown, unbefriended, classical spirit as is the ' lisp of leaves' As the vision that lured him to follow, which Dr. Shorey italicises and 'the hounds With the mist and the darkness blended ; of spring' which he does not, and that And the dream of his life was ended. modern reminiscences of the vulgate reading How cold are thy baths, ApolloJ have no weight as evidence in its favour. As a matter of fact, Jugurtha's ex- These and similar considerations can never clamation when thrust into the cold, dark be lost sight of in comparisons of ancient prison was not 'How cold are thy baths, and modern poetry. Matthew Arnold trans- Apollo,' but (addressing his Roman gaolers) forms two words of Horace Oceano dissocia- ' Jove ! How cold your bath is 1' 'HpdieXus, bili into the noble line 'The unplumbed, salt, etirej/, o>s i/fV)(pov fyifiv TO jSaAaveiov, Plutarch estranging sea.' We may hold the English Marim c. 12. If the poetic mind works so to be more poetical, but its beauty should not freely with a plain narrative of fact, how blind us as critics to the different canons watchful must we be of comparisons which that must be applied to an original, which suggest that it will render faithfully an states the relevant fact and has done. ancient conception from the nebulous In the passage first discussed the vulgate regions of sentiment and fancy ? Few poets gives poetry and sense, though sense and have had a finer knowledge of the ancient poetry alien to Horace ; at i. 35. 22 sqq. it poets than Tennyson. He sings of an gives neither. Here is Dr. Shorey's para- ' island-valley' with 'bowery hollows crowned phrase : ' Hope and white-robed Faith follow with summer seas,' just as Homer had "the fortunes of a fallen lord" and with- sung of an island, rrpf wept irovros airctpiroshold not their companionship even when «rre<£dv«i)T

TREMENHEERE'S CYNTHIA OF PROPERTIES.

The Cynthia of Propertius, done into English may perhaps pardon the translation verse by SEYMOUR G-REIG TREMENHEERE, Ungrateful sleep ! Give all I could, one of H.M. Inspectors of Schools. Mac- Roll from your lap my presents would ! millan and Co., London and New York. 1899. pp. xiii. 108. 4s. net. But who else? only the personage of whom Heine tells us ' e'est son metier.' Some ' SCHOLARS will pardon an attempt, however bald renderings there are which even bald, to render into English these exquisite scholars will pardon : when Mr Paley sings love-poems.' Why? Those who have no ' It is present to me to feel the chill, the Latin may pardon such an attempt, if they very severe chill, of a hostile public like bad verses better than silence; but I executioner,' or Mr Buckley ' They cut off do not know why bald renderings of his ears and nostrils'with the sharp brass; exquisite love-poems should be pardoned by but he, injured in his feelings, went about, those who want no renderings at all. One enduring that calamity with a frantic mind,' who cannot read or understand scholars are as grateful as other folk ; but Mr Tremenheere never rejoices the heart like omniaque ingrato largibar munera somno, this, though he does write ' To eclipse your munera de prono saepe uoluta sinu, honoured uncle strive ' and ask ' Is yours the