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Aspicis ut virides etiam nunc litera rimas
Servet, et arenti nondum se laxet hiatu.

Calphurnius, Ecloga i. v. 22.

Aspicis ut virides audito Cæsare sylvæ
Conticeant.

I return to Fracastorius.

Idem, Ecloga iv. v. 97.

animumque agitans per cuncta requiro

Quis status illorum fuerit, quæ signa dedere
Sidera, quid nostris cœlum portenderit annis.

Here you have fuerit right, and dedere wrong. I have said enough to justify my position that Fracastorius was unacquainted with the rule.

The excellences of Vida are not so numerous, nor so splendid, as those of Fracastorius. But Vida, by the fortunate guidance of his ear perhaps, rather than by grammatical accuracy, has escaped the impropriety, which I have pointed out in Fracastorius. Probably in the last century no Latin poem excelled that of Boscovitch de Solis et Lunæ defectibus. But Boscovitch is uniformly right in that use of the subjunctive, which we are now discussing. Mr. Gray was not only an eminent poet, but a most profound and correct scholar. But even Gray has fallen into the mistake which I have imputed to Fracastorius: Hæc simul assiduo depascens omnia visu, Perspiciet, vis quanta loci, quid polleat ordo, Juncturæ quis honos, ut res accendere rebus Lumina conjurant, inter se et mutua fulgent.

De Principiis Cogitandi, v. 112.

Here Gray is right, where he says perspiciet quid polleat ordo. But he is wrong when, employing ut with the power of quomodo between perspiciet and another verb, he writes, conjurant and fulgent in the indicative, when they ought to be in the subjunctive.

I shall not chase the errors of ordinary scholars; but, that the rule was unknown to some of our best scholars, will appear to you from the passages which I am going to produce. You must have heard of Dr. George, once master of Eton school, then provost of King's College, author of the celebrated and unparalleled iambics on the death of Frederick, Prince of Wales. Several of George's poems are inserted in the second volume of the Musa Etonenses, published by Prinsep; and from these poems shall be taken examples, which show that George, though a very learned teacher, was ignorant of the rule about the indefinite followed by the subjunctive. In his fine poem calied Ecclesiastes, we find :

Quis mihi vim terræ altricem sophus explicet, unde
Semina, quæ putri jacuerunt obruta sulco,
Pubescunt rediviva iterum fætuque gravantur.

Eccles.

Aspice nunc quanto studio curaque sagaci

Mellifica immensos tranant examina campos

Aëris.

Eccles.

The next instances I shall produce are from Dr. Hallam, dean of Bristol, and father of Mr. Hallam, who lately published a well-known and well-received book on the Literature of the Middle Ages:

Expedient alii, quorum mens ardua callet
Affectus lucis varios, queis didita paret

Legibus, et quæ vis detorquet tela diei
Obvia, perque auras devexo tramite mittit.
Quis tamen expediet fando, quam præpite cursu
Descendunt radii?

Dr. George is right in the following lines:

Dicite, vos, quibus arcanos natura recessus
Exposuit, quibus ingeniis, quo prædita sensu
Concipiant tantos bruta hæc animalia motus.

In the next lines here produced he is wrong again :
Qui fit ut ardentes rosa matutina rubores
Induat, expedies.

Qui fit should be qui fiat.

Ecclesiastes.

On George's verses I would add, that my observations on ut with video and cerno, having the power of quomodo, will vindicate the following passage:

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The rule would require incedant and corripuerint. I shall content myself with referring to one more Etonian, whose sagacity and learning were of a very high order; I mean Daniel Gaches:

Nec subit interea quantis se gloria rebus
Angliaca attollit; quam lato crevit adauctu
Imperii moles.

These are the words of Gaches in the congratulatory verses sent from Cambridge on the peace of 1763. They made a great noise from their boldness; and the greater, because the writer was appointed by the University a censor, whose office it was to examine all the compositions, and admit such only as were proper both in point of matter and diction. But Gaches, with that singular intrepidity which marked his whole character through life, seized and monopolized for himself the liberty which he refused to other academics. He poured forth bitter invectives against the oppressive effects of the cider tax, and the inglorious terms of the peace, and with solemn mockery he derided the intellect of the king. Have these celebrated verses found their way to Edinburgh?

My good Mr. Pillans, I put before you the errors of distinguished men, in order to show you the necessity there is for teachers to examine thoroughly, and inculcate frequently, the rule about indefinite words followed by the subjunctive mood. I tell you again and again that the prose writers, both in the earlier and later stages of the Latin language, are correct. You well say that in Bentley's note he quotes only one prose passage from Seneca, and in that passage we have, as we ought to have, the subjunctive mood. Whether Bentley made the distinction, or whether it did not occur to him to notice it at the time, I by no means decide. But the stores of his memory were so large, that, if a prose passage with the indicative had occurred to him, he would have introduced it; and here, my friend, I shall claim thanks from you and Mr. Carson, for clearing up one passage in prose, where the generality of readers believe that the indicative actually follows an indefinite word. In 1732 Schwarts published at Coburg a most use

ful Latin Grammar, and by the aid of a dictionary I make out the German illustrations as well as I can. Now, in page 656, he lays down this broad and just rule: “Omnia nomina, pronomina, adverbia, et conjunctiones, rem definitam et certam vel significantia vel postulantia, indicativum; infinitam et dubiam signantia, conjunctivum asciscunt." But in the note he says, "Interdum tamen indicativus positus est pro conjunctivo. Seneca, Epist. 94. 'Vis scire, quam falsus oculos tuos decipit fulgor.'" My friend, I should have pronounced the reading false. In the Strasburg edition of Seneca's Epistles, published 1809, the editor gives deceperit. He says, "deceperit; perperam decipit editiones." Mr. Pillans, you would be surprised at the numerous mistakes into which critics are led by false readings. One of the acutest grammarians we ever had in this country was Richard Johnson, whose Grammatical Commentaries I recommend to you very earnestly. I must, at the same time, warn you that Johnson was often misled by bad editions, and this my observation extends to some quotations in his Noctes Nottinghamicæ. It is a book not often to be met with, and, unfortunately for scholars, it was left imperfect by the very acute and learned writer. If you lived near me, you would often have opportunities to avail yourself of the advantages I have derived from long and severe attention to these grammatical niceties; and I must entreat you and Mr. Carson to be on your guard, when you quote passages of classical antiquity.

Mr. Pillans will see plainly that the Roman writers of prose steadily keep the rule; that the comic writers, with the laxity of common discourse, often neglect it; that a few other Roman poets now and then break it for the convenience of the metre; and that later writers of Latin poetry neglect the rule when it suits their metre, and observe it at other times, and were probably one and all ignorant of the principle, and were guided by their ear, which is the very guidance also to some excellent modern writers of Latin prose. Here, then, a question will arise, Why may not a modern writer of Latin verse take the liberty, which evidently was taken by some ancient writers of Latin verse? My answer is, in the first place, it is better to know a principle than not to know it; secondly, on the ground of uniformity, it is better to adhere to the principle, when well known, than to swerve from it; thirdly, that, in point of propriety, it is safer to follow Lucretius, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, and Tibullus, who uniformly follow the rule, than Catullus, who neglected it once; than Propertius, who in two passages neglects it; than Lucan, who twice neglects it; than Claudian, who twice neglects it; and than Persius, who twice neglects it. Really, on the best principles of criticism, I would discourage young men from breaking the rule in Latin verse, and I would rigorously insist on the observance of it in Latin prose. My ear is always offended by the violation of the rule; and, by repeated admonitions and clear explanations, I enabled my boys to understand, and compelled them to adhere to the principle. Before I conclude, I will carry back the attention of Mr. Pillans to Burman's note on the first book of Lucan. Even Burman, who, like Gerard Vossius, is an advocate for latitude, writes thus: "Nolo ex corrupta apud Ovidium Epist. x. v. 86.

Quis scit an hæc sævas tigridas insula habet?

argumentum capere; sed tamen temere nimis Heinsium pronuntiare

Latine non dici, ‘quis scit an habet,' sed dicendum ‘an habeat,' arbitror.” This is an honest and judicious concession. If Mr. Pillans will look at the 10th Epistle of the Heroides, v. 86. vol. 1. of Burman's edition of Ovid, he will see, from the various readings of Mss, and the various conjectures of critics, that there is some corruption in the passage, “Duo sunt," says Heinsius, " quæ in hoc versu offendunt. Primo, quod Latine haud dicitur, Quis scit an habet,' sed, ‘an habeat.'" The two least improbable conjectures are,

Quis scit an hæc tigres insula sæva ferat?

Quis scit an et sæva tigride Dia vacet ?

The first conjecture is far too removed from the ductus literarum. I object to vacet tigride, which does not resemble cultu vacare. If I say terra vacat cultu, the meaning is plain. The land wants the cultivation which it ought to have. But if I say tigride vacat, then surely the land is free from the annoyance which it ought not to have, and this favorable sense is the very reverse of what we should expect. What is the subject of terror? that the land is not free from a tiger? whereas this reading would suggest that it is so free. If we fear lions, we must also fear tigers; and it were strange to say, in one line, that there are lions to be feared, and, in the next, that there is no fear of tigers. I really do not know what the true reading was; but I am quite clear that the original reading was not such as left habet after quis scit an.

I desire Mr. Pillans to consider well the manner in which haud scio an is used in Latin. The subject is curious, and there are some judicious remarks on it in the second volume of the Port Royal Latin Grammar, translated by Nugent, page 165. Mr. Pillans will also look at pages 474 and 475 of Scheller De Præceptis Styli bene Latini, where he will find that nescio an has the power of nescio an non, and that, if a verb follows, it is always in the subjunctive. Mr. Pillans will also consult Voltenii Lexicon, p. 1457. The direct form of such construction is dubitandi. The indirect import is affirmation.

Now the meaning of definite and indefinite ought to be explained: when we use the indicative, the proposition is definite. But there is something doubtful or indefinite, when the subjunctive is put in propositions such as I have stated. With the indicative a proposition is directly and uniformly positive; but, if less positive, it carries less certainty, when we use the subjunctive in an indefinite form. Consider this well logically, the definite is opposed to the indefinite; grammatically, the interrogative construction differs from the indefinite construction. Pray attend to this distinction in the logical powers of sentences, and the grammatical construction of them, and pray observe what I am going to add. It is a convenience, and a very marked property of the Latin language, that the indefinite construction can be employed as I have stated it. But surely, Mr. Pillans, such an accurate denotation must have arisen, when a language had passed from its early and rude infancy to marked precision and perspicuity. It is however improbable, that the accuracy, which by degrees was established in writing, should in any period of the language have been steadily observed in common discourse; and by these means we can easily account for the frequent neglect of the rule which I have noticed in Plautus and Terence.

I am sure that your good sense will point out to you the propriety of the foregoing remark; and I anticipate the prompt and entire concur

rence of your profound, philosophical countryman, Dugald Stewart. You know very well the high opinion which I have of Dr. Gregory's Latinity; and he will be happy, if not proud, when he knows that he is in a very unusual degree correct in employing right construction, when so many English scholars, of the first eminence in this country, have fallen into mistakes. I think it not very likely that he knows any thing of the rule. But his ear and his taste guided him right, and his great sagacity would lead him to understand the rule, and to approve of it. I beg leave to assure you, that the Italian prose writers of Latin in this age are seldom or never wrong, and they too in all probability had no other guidance than their taste. You will see plainly, by the length of these papers, the anxiety I feel that the boys of your Highschool may have the full benefit of instruction from such instructors as yourself and Mr. Carson.

Yesterday I had a letter from Leonard Horner, and finding that he is in London, I shall send this packet to him, and desire him to deliver it to you. I am still very poorly; and you have a proof of my esteem and regard, when, amidst the pains and debility under which I labor, I make such an exertion, as I have now made in dictating this letter to you. Remember me to all my friends. I have most attentively read Dr. Brown's book on cause and effect. It proves that he was worthy to be the successor of Dugald Stewart. Ask him if he ever read a book, written by one Arpe, de Fato. It is chiefly historical, and gives a list of those who have written on fate, fortune, necessity, &c., but is worth reading.

Dr. Brown knows the imperfect state in which Cicero's book de Fato is come down to us. But what is there said of causæ antecedentes, assisted me when I was reading Dr. Brown. I am not ashamed to add, that the work of Grotius de Fato deserves attention. Brown's book is most excellent, and I have recommended it to one of my metaphysical countrymen. I am truly your friend,

I have not time to revise.

[Vol. viii. p. 533.]

S. PARR.

ON THE MYSTERIES OF ELEUSIS.
No. III. [Concluded from No. LXXIX.]

We will now consider the more arcane parts of the mysteries, which consisted in representing the history of Ceres and Baubo.1 For a description of these representations, I refer my reader to Mr. Taylor's "Dissertation," and to Clemens and Arnobius, from whom he has taken it. The passage from Psellus, which he gives in his appendix, as it serves to show how all the other mysteries rested on, and were included in these of Eleusis, will

1 Βαυβω· τιθηνη Δημητρος. Hesychius.

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