in order to see how no artistic devices can rival native vigour. Still, on the whole, it must be allowed that these allusions of which Virgil, like Milton, is so fond do, even for us, add a varied interest to the subject, while to ancient readers they must have been far more attractive, charged as they would be with reminiscences of well-known works of literature, or 'with the memories of foreign travel or of residence in remote provinces, or with the interest attaching to lands recently made known.'1 The poem abounds in phrases of singular felicity, such 'jewels five-words long' as Lethaeo perfusa papavera somno 1. 78; cum se nux plurima silvis | induet in florem 1. 188; vento semper rubet aurea Phoebe 1.431; squalent abducis arva colonis 1. 507; casus abies visura marinos 2. 68; redit agricolis labor actus in orbem 2. 398; sacra deum sanctique patres 2. 473; durae rapit inclementia mortis 3.68; sacra nemus accubet umbra 3. 334; admiranda tibi levium spectacula rerum 4. 3. Take even shorter phrases and mark the charm of brumae intractabilis 1. 211; anni spem 1. 224; intempesta silet nox 1. 247; ver adsiduum 2. 149; caeli indulgentia 2. 345; iustissima tellus 2. 460 ; latis otia fundis 2. 468; inexorabile fatum 2. 491 ; gressus glomerare superbos 3. 117; daedala fingere tecta 4. 179; stat fortuna domus 4. 207. The artistic beauty of some of the descriptions is of the highest order, and in his power of sketching a scene in the fewest possible words Virgil is almost without a rival. The opening lines (1. 43-6) of the poem afford an excellent instance. In the background are the 'hoary' mountains, in the front a stream swollen with 1 Sellar's Virgil, p. 235. their melting snows, and a rich tilth fast yielding to the west wind's warmth, while to give life to the scene there are the sturdy labouring bulls, the ploughman bent over his work, and the ploughshare glistening in the spring sunshine. The picture is complete, and its effect is the more powerful because of the moral lesson that is enforced by the emphatic reference to vigorous toil in the words depresso, iam tum, ingemere, attritus, splendescere. Consider, again, the homely charm of the picture of a cottar's winter evening 1. 291-96; the vivid account of a bird pursued by a sea-eagle 1. 406-9; the powerful description of a storm 1. 314-34;1 the sketch of a harvest-home 2. 206; the fine suggestion of illimitable distance 3. 341; or, if it is possible to abstract the mind from its unequalled pathos, observe the marvellous simplicity of pictorial effect in the passage 3. 517 it tristis arator maerentem abiungens fraterna morte iuvencum, atque opere in medio defixa relinquit aratra. Indeed it is in the combination, which these lines exhibit, of deep feeling with truthful representation of fact that the real test of a great artist is to be found, and in this respect Virgil is unsurpassed. When, to illustrate the character of good soil, he writes 2. 198 et qualem infelix amisit Mantua campum the charm of the illustration consists not half so much in the purely pictorial beauty of the second line as in 1 In the note on 1. 328 will be found a criticism on it by one of the most appreciative scholars of this or any century. the way in which it is blended with the sad human regret of the first.1 Or again in 3. 520 non mollia possunt prata movere animum, non qui per saxa volutus the contrast between the dying ox and the beauty of the scene (though, doubtless, borrowed from Lucretius) exhibits the finest artistic faculty.2 Throughout it is by this power of imparting living interest to his subject that Virgil turns a treatise on husbandry into a true poem. Four points which illustrate this deserve attention-(i) the emphasis laid on the duty of hard work, (ii) the philosophic and moral lessons which are suggested, and the sympathy everywhere exhibited with (iii) plant and (iv) animal life. (i) A strong sense of the necessity and dignity of labour breathes throughout the poem from beginning to end. The passage 1. 46, 47 has been already referred to, and in 1. 64, 65 there is a similar emphasis on primis, extemplo, fortes, while the rhythm of 65 seems unconsciously to reproduce the sense of effort 1 Such a line as 4. 292 et viridem Aegyptum nigra fecundat harena is as pictorial as 2. 199, but it has not the same charm, because the ethical element is wanting. In his famous description of Italian towns (2. 155-57) the purely pictorial effect is admirably blended with the sense of human effort (operumque laborem, manu) and historic interest (antiquos); see note ad loc. 2 As an animal-painter Landseer shows the same faculty. For the still higher faculty of purely creative imagination, which only the greatest poets or painters possess, and which Virgil exhibits in the sixth book of the Aeneid, the Georgics afford little scope, but such a line as 3. 552 pallida Tisiphone Morbos agit ante Metumque deserves attention. which is in the poet's mind. Notice the proud description of a victorious struggle with the fields 1. 99 exercetque frequens tellurem atque imperat arvis. Then 1. 104-17 is wholly an account of the care needed to overcome difficulties, and in the succeeding paragraph (1. 118—59) the poet rises to a still higher view of the husbandman's toil: he grasps the great idea that what might seem to have been a curse upon the ground is in reality a blessing in disguise, sent designedly (1. 121) by heaven, that men by overcoming difficulties might win strength and courage and wisdom 'with labour I must earn My bread; what harm? Idleness had been worse.' 1 In 1. 61 the line scilicet omnibus est labor impendendus seems to enforce this lesson with the strokes of a sledgehammer. In 2. 355 you must 'heave' the hoe, the ploughshare must be deep-pressed,' and the oxen 'struggle.' 'Up and be doing' is the motto- quare agite. . . agricolae 2. 35. Work is 'never finished’(2. 398); the ground must be ploughed 'thrice and four times' and 'everlastingly' broken up, the round of toil returning like the revolving year (2. 401). There must be no shirking; a man must do things himself,' 'himself with his own hand' (ipse, ipse manu, cf. 4. 112). Work and work unconscionable' (labor inprobus 1. 145) is the one true 'conqueror of the world.' 2 1 Par. Lost 10. 1054. 2 Incessant pains The end obtains.'-THOMAS ELLWOOD. (ii) Virgil adds to the interest of his theme by connecting it with subjects which are of deeper and more philosophic import. The noble passage (G. 2. 475) beginning felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas has been already referred to (p. v), but other instances deserve note. In 1. 415-23 he explains why birds are good-weather prophets in a manner which would have delighted Lucretius,and 1. 199—203 a remark on the tendency of cultivated seeds to degenerate induces him to reflect on the general law that degeneration always follows relaxation of effort with equal rapidity and certainty. The distinct characteristics or different soils are an indication of the immutable laws which govern all countries since the Creation, 1. 60; the movement of the celestial bodies in their appointed paths through space marks a beneficent plan and purpose (idcirco. ... 1. 231). If as the plant grows so the tree inclines, the lesson to be learnt is the importance of good habits in youth-adeo in teneris consuescere multum est 2. 272-and the need of kindly care and kind consideration in those who are its guardians-parcendum teneris 2. 362. Even the laws of breeding suggest reflections (2. 66-8) which touch the deepest feeling and are, in spite of their context, among the best-known lines of Virgil; while the recommendation to use the knife to an ulcer is made supremely poetical by the terse addition alitur vitium vivitque tegendo (3. 454). 1 1 The lines of Burns which are, perhaps, most frequently quoted'O wad some power the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us '— are from a poem the title of which few who quote them remember. |