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

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610 EXPLANATORY NOTES, BOOK II., EPISTLE I.
caa ia more fortunate than the ancient heroes, who were not ranked among
the gods until after their death. — 6. Post ingentia facta, &c. "After
mighty exploits received into the temples of the gods," i. e., only graced
with divine honors after a long and toilsome career of labors.— 7. Colunt.
"1?hey civilize." Equivalent to cultos reddunt.— 9. Agros assignant.
"Assign fixed settlements." Ploravere suis, &c. "Lamented that the
favor hoped for by them was not awarded to their deserts."
10-16, 10. Diram qui coniudit h^dram. Hercules, the conqueror of
the Lernean hydra.—11. Fatali labore. "By his fated labors," i. e., the
labors imposed on him by Fate.—12. Comperit invidiam supremojine domari.
" Found that envy was to be overcome by death alone." A beaatifol
idea. Every other monster yielded to the prowess of Hercules.
Envy alone bade defiance to his arm, and was to be conquered only upon
the hero's surrender of existence.—13. Urit enimfulgore sua, quiprcBgravat
artes, &c. " For he, who bears down by superior merit the arts placed
beneath him, burns by his very splendor," i. e., he, whose Buperiorily is
oppressive to inferior minds, excites envy by this very pre-eminence.
Artes is here equivalent in effect to artifices.—14. Exstifictus amabUur
idem. "The same, when dead,.will be an object of our love." When the
too powerful splendor is withdrawn, our natural veneraticm of it takes
place.—15. Preesenti tibi maturos largimur konores, &c. A happy stroke
of flattery, and which the poet, with great skill, makes to have a direct
bearing on his subject. According to him, the Roman people had, with
equal justice and wisdom, heaped divine honors on Augustus while yet
present among them, aud yet this same people were so unfair in matters
of taste as to treat the living bard, whatever his merit, with contempt,
and to reserve their homage for those whom they dignified with the name
of ancients. Thus the very exception to the general rule of merit neglected
while alive, which forms the striking encomium in the case of Augas-
tus, furnishes the po|t with a powerful argument for the sapport of his
main proposition. Maturos konores. " Living honors."—16. Jurandasque
tuum per numen ponimus aras. " And we raise altars whereon men
are to swear by thy divudty."
18-25. 18. In uno. " In one thing alone."—20. Simili ratione modo-
que. "After a similar rule and manner."—21. Suisque temporibus defuneta.
"And to have run out their allotted periods," i. c, and already
past.—23. Sic fautor veterum. " Such favorers of antiquity," i. e., such
strenuous advocates for the productions of earlier daysJ The reference is
still to the Roman people. Tahulas peccare vetantes. " The tables forbidding
to transgress." Alluding to the twelve tables of the Roman law,
the foandation of all their jurisprudence. Horace would have done well
to have considered if, amid the manifold improvements of the Augustan
poets, they had judged wisely in rejecting those rich and sonorous diphthongs
of the tabula peccare vetantes which still sound with such strength
and majesty in the lines of Lucretius.—24. Quas bis quinque viri sanxerunt.
" Wuich the decemviri enacted," i. e., which the decemviri, beu^
authorized by the people, proclaimed as laws. Fcedera regum. Alluding
to the league of Romulus with the Sabines, and that of Tarquinius Superbns
with the people of Gabii. Dionysius states (iv., 68) that the league
made by Tarquin with the people of Grabii was extant in the temple of
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