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

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EXPLANATORY NOTES. BOOK I., EPISTLK XII. 581
thy pecuniary affairs and the iilveatigations of philosophy, and not, like
Qemocritas, sacrifice the former to the latter. Ironical. Democriti. Democritas
was a native of Abdera, in Thrace, and the sacceasor of Leacippus
la the Eleatic school. He was contemporary with Socrates, Anaxagoras,
Archelaus, Parmenidea, Zeno, and Protagoras. The story here
told of him deserves little credit, as well as the other, which states that
he gave up his patrimony to his country. He is commonly known as the
laughing philosopheg. Peais. Supply alienum.— 13. Dum peregre est
animus sine corpore velox, Horace, in this, follows the Platonic notion,
that the soul, when employed in contemplation, was in a manner detached
from the body, that it might the more easily mount abov^ earthly
things, and approach nearer the objects it desired to contemplate.
14-19. 14. Inter scabiem tantam ct contagia lucri. " Amid so great an
itch for and contagion of gain (as now prevails)." Compare Orelli " : Scabies
significat acria avaritiffi irritamenta."—15. Adhuc. " Still." Equivalent
to nuTic quoque.—16. Q,U(b mare compescant causa. " What causes
set bounds to the sea," ». e., the causes of the tides, &c. Quid tenyperet
annum. "What regulates the changes of the year."—17. Stellas sponte
sua, &c. Alluding to the planets.—18. Quid premat obscurum luncc, &c
"What spreads obscurity over the moon, what brings out her orb," i. e.,
what .occasions the eclipses of the moon, what the reappearance of her
light. Premat is here equivalent to abscondat.—19. Serum Concordia
discors. " The discordant harmony of things." The reference here is to
those principles of things, which, though ever in direct opposition to each
other, yet ever agree in preserving the great scheme of the universe. In
other words, there is in this scheme apparent discord, but real concord.
20-94. ZO. Smpedocles, an Stertinium deliret acuTnen. "WhetherEmpedocles,
or the acuteness of Stertinius be in the wrong." Empedocles
was a native of Agrigentum, in Sicily, and flourished about 444 B.C. He
supposed the world to consist of four elements, by whose attraction and
repulsion all things were formed. The Stoics, on the other hand, viewed
a divinity as the cause of all. Stertinius, the ridiculous " sapientum acta
vus" (Sat. ii., 3, 293), is humorously made the representative of the lattet
sect.—21. Verum seu pisces. Ice. An ironical allnsion to the doctrines of
Pythagoras respecting the metempsychosis, according to which the seals
of men passed not only into animals, but also into plants, &c. Hence to
feed on these becomes actual murder. Empedocles agreed with Pythagoras
in a belief in the transmigration of souls. Horace, therefore, jokes
here, as if Iccius, like Empedocles, was a Pythagorean, and held all organized
bodies to be animated.—22. Ulere Pompeio Orospko. " Give a kind
reception to my friend Fompeius Grosphus." l/tere is equivalent here to
utere ut amico. The individual here meant is the same to whom the poet
addresses the sixteenth ode of the second book, according to the opinion
of some commentators. (Compare Introductory Remarks, Ode ii., 7.)
Ultra defer. "Readily grant it."—24. Vilis uanicorum est annona, &c
" The price of friends is low when good men want any thing," i. e., friends
are to be had cheap when good men like Grosphus want any thing, be
cause they are so moderate in their demands.
25-37. 25. Romana res. " The Roman affaii's." The poet here pr»
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