The Satires of Juvenal, Persius, Sulpicia, and Lucilius
As if from Hammon's secret fount it came;
Since Delphi now, if we may credit fame,
Gives no responses, and a long dark night 800
Conceals the future hour from mortal sight.
Of these, the chief (such credit guilt obtains!)
Is he, who, banished oft, and oft in chains,
Stands forth the veriest knave; he who foretold
The death of Galba--to his rival sold! 805
No juggler must for fame or profit hope,
Who has not narrowly escaped the rope;
Begged hard for exile, and, by special grace,
Obtained confinement in some desert place.--
To him your Tanaquil applies, in doubt 810
How long her jaundiced mother may hold out;
But first, how long her husband: next, inquires,
When she shall follow, to their funeral pyres,
Her sisters, and her uncles; last, if fate
Will kindly lengthen out the adulterer's date 815
Beyond her own;--content, if he but live,
And sure that heaven has nothing more to give!
Yet she may still be suffered; for, what woes
The louring aspect of old Saturn shows;
Or in what sign bright Venus ought to rise, 820
To shed her mildest influence from the skies;
Or what fore-fated month to gain is given,
And what to loss (the mysteries of heaven),
She knows not, nor pretends to know: but flee
The dame, whose Manual of Astrology 825
Still dangles at her side, smooth as chafed gum,
And fretted by her everlasting thumb!--
Deep in the science now, she leaves her mate
To go, or stay; but will not share his fate,
Withheld by trines and sextiles; she will look, 830
Before her chair be ordered, in the book,
For the fit hour; an itching eye endure,
Nor, till her scheme be raised, attempt the cure;
Nay, languishing in bed, receive no meat,
Till Petosyris bid her rise and eat. 835
The curse is universal: high and low
Are mad alike the future hour to know.
The rich consult a Babylonian seer,
Skilled in the mysteries of either sphere;
Or a gray-headed priest, hired by the state, 840
To watch the lightning, and to expiate.
The middle sort, a quack, at whose command
They lift the forehead, and make bare the hand;
While the sly lecher in the table pries,
And claps it wantonly, with gloating eyes. 845
The poor apply to humbler cheats, still found
Beside the Circus wall, or city mound;
While she, whose neck no golden trinket bears,
To the dry ditch, or dolphin's tower, repairs,
And anxiously inquires which she shall choose, 850
The tapster, or old-clothes man? which refuse?
Yet these the pangs of childbirth undergo,
And all the yearnings of a mother know;
These, urged by want, assume the nurse's care,
And learn to breed the children which they bear. 855
Those shun both toil and danger; for, though sped,
The wealthy dame is seldom brought to bed:
Such the dire power of drugs, and such the skill
They boast, to cause miscarriages at will!
Weep'st thou? O fool! the blest invention hail, 860
And give the potion, if the gossips fail;
For, should thy wife her nine months' burden bear,
An Æthiop's offspring might thy fortunes heir;
A sooty thing, fit only to affray,
And, seen at morn, to poison all the day! 865
Supposititious breeds, the hope and joy
Of fond, believing husbands, I pass by;
The beggars' bantlings, spawned in open air,
And left by some pond side, to perish there.--
From hence your Flamens, hence your Salians come; 870
Your Scauri, chiefs and magistrates of Rome!
Fortune stands tittering by, in playful mood,
And smiles, complacent, on the sprawling brood;
Takes them all naked to her fostering arms,
Feeds from her mouth, and in her bosom warms: 875
Then, to the mansions of the great she bears
The precious brats, and, for herself, prepares
A secret farce; adopts them for her own:
And, when her nurslings are to manhood grown,
She brings them forth, rejoiced to see them sped, 880
And wealth and honors dropping on their head!
Some purchase charms, some, more pernicious still,
Thessalian philters, to subdue the will
Of an uxorious spouse, and make him bear
Blows, insults, all a saucy wife can dare. 885
Hence that swift lapse to second childhood; hence
Those vapors which envelop every sense;
This strange forgetfulness from hour to hour;
And well, if this be all:--more fatal power,
More terrible effects, the dose may have, 890
And force you, like Caligula, to rave,
When his Cæsonia squeezed into the bowl
The dire excrescence of a new-dropp'd foal.--
Then Uproar rose; the universal chain
Of Order snapped, and Anarchy's wild reign 895
Came on apace, as if the queen of heaven
Had fired the Thunderer, and to madness driven.
Thy mushroom, Agrippine! was innocent,
To this accursed draught; that only sent
One palsied, bedrid sot, with gummy eyes, 900
And slavering lips, heels foremost to the skies:
This, to wild fury roused a bloody mind,
And called for fire and sword; this potion joined
In one promiscuous slaughter high and low,
And leveled half the nation at a blow. 905
Such is the power of philters! such the ill,
One sorceress can effect by wicked skill!
They hate their husband's spurious issue:--this,
If this were all, were not, perhaps, amiss:
But they go farther; and 'tis now some time 910
Since poisoning sons-in-law scarce seemed a crime.
Mark then, ye fatherless! what I advise,
And trust, O, trust no dainties, if you're wise:
Ye heirs to large estates! touch not that fare,
Your mother's fingers have been busy there; 915
See! it looks livid, swollen:--O check your haste,
And let your wary fosterfather taste,
Whate'er she sets before you: fear her meat,
And be the first to look, the last to eat.
But this is fiction all! I pass the bound 920
Of Satire, and encroach on Tragic ground!
Deserting truth, I choose a fabled theme,
And, like the buskined bards of Greece, declaim,
In deep-mouthed tones, in swelling strains, on crimes
As yet unknown to our Rutulian climes! 925
Would it were so! but Pontia cries aloud,
"No, I performed it." See! the fact's avowed--
"I mingled poison for my children, I;
'Twas found upon me, wherefore then deny?"
What, two at once, most barbarous viper! two! 930
"Nay, seven, had seven been mine: believe it true!"
Now let us credit what the tragic stage
Displays of Progne and Medea's rage;
Crimes of dire name, which, disbelieved of yore,
Become familiar, and revolt no more; 935
Those ancient dames in scenes of blood were bold,
And wrought fell deeds, but not, as ours, for gold:--
In every age, we view, with less surprise,
Such horrors as from bursts of fury rise,
When stormy passions, scorning all control, 940
Rend the mad bosom, and unseat the soul.
As when impetuous winds, and driving rain,
Mine some huge rock that overhangs the plain,
The cumbrous mass descends with thundering force,
And spreads resistless ruin in its course. 945
Curse on the woman, who reflects by fits,
And in cold blood her cruelties commits!--
They see, upon the stage, the Grecian wife
Redeeming with her own her husband's life;
Yet, in her place, would willingly deprive 950
Their lords of breath to keep their dogs alive!
Abroad, at home, the Belides you meet,
And Clytemnestras swarm in every street;
But here the difference lies:--those bungling wives,
With a blunt axe hacked out their husbands' lives; 955
While now, the deed is done with dexterous art,
And a drugged bowl performs the axe's part.
Yet, if the husband, prescient of his fate,
Have fortified his breast with mithridate,
She baffles him e'en there, and has recourse 960
To the old weapon for a last resource.
SATIRE VII.
TO TELESINUS.
Yes, all the hopes of learning, 'tis confess'd,
And all the patronage, on CÆSAR rest:
For he alone the drooping Nine regards--
When, now, our best, and most illustrious bards,
Quit their ungrateful studies, and retire, 5
Bagnios and bakehouses, for bread, to hire;
With humbled views, a life of toil embrace,
And deem a crier's business no disgrace;
Since Clio, driven by hunger from the shade,
Mixes in crowds, and bustles for a trade. 10
And truly, if (the bard's too frequent curse)
No coin be found in your Pierian purse,
'Twere not ill done to copy, for the nonce,
Machæra, and turn auctioneer at once.
Hie, my poetic friend; in accents loud, 15
Commend your precious lumber to the crowd,
Old tubs, stools, presses, wrecks of many a chest,
Paccius' damned plays, Thebes, Tereus, and the rest.--
And better so--than haunt the courts of law,
And swear, for hire, to what you never saw: 20
Leave this resource to Cappadocian knights,
To Gallogreeks, and such new-fangled wights,
As want, or infamy, has chased from home,
And driven, in barefoot multitudes, to Rome.
Come, my brave youths!--the genuine sons of rhyme, 25
Who, in sweet numbers, couch the true sublime,
Shall, from this hour, no more their fate accuse,
Or stoop to pains unworthy of the Muse.
Come, my brave youths! your tuneful labors ply,
Secure of favor; lo! the imperial eye 30
Looks round, attentive, on each rising bard,
For worth to praise, for genius to reward!
But if for other patronage you look,
And therefore write, and therefore swell your book,
Quick, call for wood, and let the flames devour 35
The hapless produce of the studious hour;
Or lock it up, to moths and worms a prey,
And break your pens, and fling your ink away:--
Or pour it rather o'er your epic flights,
Your battles, sieges (fruit of sleepless nights), 40
Pour it, mistaken men, who rack your brains
In dungeons, cocklofts, for heroic strains;
Who toil and sweat to purchase mere renown,
A meagre statue, and an ivy crown!
Here bound your expectations: for the great, 45
Grown, wisely, covetous, have learned, of late,
To praise, and ONLY praise, the high-wrought strain,
As boys, the bird of Juno's glittering train.
Meanwhile those vigorous years, so fit to bear
The toils of agriculture, commerce, war, 50
Spent in this idle trade, decline apace,
And age, unthought of, stares you in the face:--
O then, appalled to find your better days
Have earned you naught but poverty and praise,
At all your barren glories you repine, 55