The works of Horace : with English notes, critical and ... - Cristo Raul

EXPLANATORY NOTES'. EPISTLES. 541
correctness of his taste, and the extent and variety of his knowledge, that
a body of criticism might be selected from his works more perfect in its
kind than any thing which antiquity has bequeathed us." Of course, no
person can dispute the correctness or soundness of Horace's judgment
but he was somewhat of a cold critic, and from his habits as a satirist had
acquired the Parnassian sneer. Ho evidently attached more importance
to regularity of plan, to correctness and terseness of style, than to originality
of genius or fertility of invention. He admitted no deviation from the
strictest propriety. He held in abhorrence every thing incongruous or
misplaced, he allowed no pageantry on the stage, and tolerated nothing
approachiug the horrible in tragedy or the farcical in comedy. I am sat-
isfied that he would not have admired Shakspeare ; he would have con-
sidered Addison and Pope as much finer poets, and would have included
Falstaff, Autolycus, Sir Toby Belch, and all the clowns and boasters of the
great dramatist, in the same censure which he bestows on the Plavtinos
sales, and the Mimes of Laberius. Of poetry he talks with no gireat enthusiasm,
at least in his critical works ; of poets in general he speaks at
best with compassion and indulgence ; of his illustrious predecessors in
particular, with disparagentent and contumely. In his ethical verses, oo
the other hand, connected as they are with his love of a rural life of tran
quillity, freedom, and retirement, there is always something heartfelt and
glowing. A few of his speculative notions in morals may be erroneous,
but his practical results are full of truth and wisdom. His philosophy, it
has been said, gives too much dignity and grace to indolence places too
;
much happiness in a passive existence, and is altogether destructive of
lofly views. But in the age of Horace, the Boman world had got enough
of lofty views, and his sentiments must be estimated, not abstractly, but
in reference to what was expedient or salutary at the time. After the
experience which mankind had suffered, it was not the duty of a moralist
to sharpen the dagger of a second Brutus ; and maxims which might have
flourished in the age of Bcipio or Epaminondas, would have been misplaced
and injurious now. Such virtues, however, as it was yet permitted
to exercise, and such as could be practiced without danger to the state,
are warmly and assiduously inculcated.
" Horace," says Dryden, "instructs us how to combat our vices, to reg-
ulate our passions, to follow nature, to give bounds to our desires, to distinguish
between truth and falsehood, and between our conceptions of
things and things themselves ; to come back from our prejudicate opin-
ions, to understand exactly the principles and motives of all our actions,
and to avoid the ridicule into which all men necessarQy fall, who are intoxicated
with those nations which they have received from their masters,
and which they obstinately retain, without examining whether or not
they be founded on right reason. In a word, he labors to render us happy
in relation to ourselves, agreeable and faitbfdl to our friends, and discreet,
serviceable, and well bred in relation to those with whom we are
obliged to live and to converse." And though, perhaps, we may not very
higUy estimate the moral character of the poet himself, yet it can not be
doubted, that, when many of his epistles were penned, his moral sense
and feelings must have been of a highly elevated description ; for where
shall we find remonstrances more just and beautiful against luxury, envy,
and ambition ; against all the pampered pleasures of the body, and all tha
;