The Satires of Juvenal, Persius, Sulpicia, and Lucilius
May cancel every _item_ framed before
(Won by his friend's vast merits, and beset,
On all sides, by the inextricable net), 175
And, in one line, convey plate, jewels, gold,
Lands, every thing to him, "to have and hold."
With victory crowned, Pacuvius struts along,
And smiles contemptuous on the baffled throng;
Then counts his gains, and deems himself o'erpaid 180
For the cheap murder of one wretched maid.
Health to the man! and may he THUS get more
Than Nero plundered! pile his shining store
High, mountain high; in years a Nestor prove,
And, loving none, ne'er know another's love! 185
SATIRE XIII.
TO CALVINUS.
Man, wretched man, whene'er he stoops to sin,
Feels, with the act, a strong remorse within;
'Tis the first vengeance: Conscience tries the cause,
And vindicates the violated laws;
Though the bribed Prætor at their sentence spurn, 5
And falsify the verdict of the Urn.
What says the world, not always, friend, unjust,
Of his late injury, this breach of trust?
That thy estate so small a loss can bear,
And that the evil, now no longer rare, 10
Is one of that inevitable set,
Which man is born to suffer and forget.
Then moderate thy grief: 'tis mean to show
An anguish disproportioned to the blow.
But thou, so new to crosses, as to feel 15
The slightest portion of the slightest ill,
Art tired with rage, because a friend forswears
The sacred pledge, intrusted to his cares.
What, thou, Calvinus, bear so weak a mind!
Thou, who hast left full three-score years behind! 20
Heaven, have they taught thee nothing! nothing, friend!
And art thou grown gray-headed to no end!--
Wisdom, I know, contains a sovereign charm,
To vanquish fortune, or at least disarm:
Blest they who walk in her unerring rule!-- 25
Nor those unblest, who, tutored in life's school,
Have learned of old experience to submit,
And lightly bear the yoke they can not quit.
What day so sacred, which no guilt profanes,
No secret fraud, no open rapine stains? 30
What hour, in which no dark assassins prowl,
Nor point the sword for hire, nor drug the bowl?
THE GOOD, ALAS, ARE FEW! "The valued file,"
Less than the gates of Thebes, the mouths of Nile!
For now an age is come, that teems with crimes, 35
Beyond all precedent of former times;
An age so bad, that Nature can not frame
A metal base enough to give it name!
Yet you, indignant at a paltry cheat,
Call heaven and earth to witness the deceit, 40
With cries as deafening, as the shout that breaks
From the bribed audience, when Fæsidius speaks.
Dotard in nonage! are you to be told
What loves, what graces, deck another's gold?
Are you to learn, what peals of mirth resound, 45
At your simplicity, from all around?
When you step forth, and, with a serious air, }
Bid them abstain from perjury, and beware }
To tempt the altars--for A GOD IS THERE! }
Idle old man! there was, indeed, a time, 50
When the rude natives of this happy clime
Cherished such dreams: 'twas ere the king of heaven,
To change his sceptre for a scythe was driven;
Ere Juno yet the sweets of love had tried,
Or Jove advanced beyond the caves of Ide. 55
'Twas when no gods indulged in sumptuous feasts,
No Ganymede, no Hebe served the guests;
No Vulcan, with his sooty labors foul,
Limped round, officious, with the nectared bowl;
But each in private dined: 'twas when the throng 60
Of godlings, now beyond the scope of song,
The courts of heaven, in spacious ease, possess'd,
And with a lighter load poor Atlas press'd!--
Ere Neptune's lot the watery world obtained,
Or Dis and his Sicilian consort reigned; 65
Ere Tityus and his ravening bird were known,
Ixion's wheel, or Sisyphus's stone:
While yet the shades confessed no tyrant's power,
And all below was one Elysian bower!
Vice was a phœnix in that blissful time, 70
Believed, but never seen: and 'twas a crime,
Worthy of death, such awe did years engage,
If manhood rose not up to reverend age,
And youth to manhood, though a larger hoard
Of hips and acorns graced the stripling's board. 75
Then, then was age so venerable thought,
That every day increase of honor brought;
And children, in the springing down, revered
The sacred promise of a hoary beard!
Now, if a friend, miraculously just, 80
Restore the pledge, with all its gathered rust,
'Tis deemed a portent, worthy to appear
Among the wonders of the Tuscan year;
A prodigy of faith, which threats the state,
And a ewe lamb can scarcely expiate!-- 85
Struck at the view, if now I chance to see
A man of ancient worth and probity,
To pregnant mules the MONSTER I compare,
Or fish upturned beneath the wondering share:
Anxious and trembling for the woe to come, 90
As if a shower of stones had fallen on Rome;
As if a swarm of bees, together clung,
Down from the Capitol, thick-clustering, hung;
Or Tiber, swollen to madness, burst away,
And roll'd, a milky deluge, to the sea. 95
And dost thou at a trivial loss repine!
What, if another, by a friend like thine,
Is stripp'd of ten times more! a third, again,
Of what his bursting chest would scarce contain!
For 'tis so common, in this age of ours, 100
So easy, to contemn the Immortal Powers,
That, can we but elude man's searching eyes.
We laugh to scorn the witness of the skies.
Mark, with how bold a voice, and fixed a brow,
The villain dares his treachery disavow! 105
"By the all-hallowed orb that flames above,
I HAD IT NOT! By the red bolts of Jove,
By the winged shaft that laid the Centaur low,
By Dian's arrows, by Apollo's bow,
By the strong lance that Mars delights to wield, 110
By Neptune's trident, by Minerva's shield,
And every weapon that, to vengeance given,
Stores the tremendous magazine of heaven!--
Nay, IF I HAD, I'll slay this son of mine,
And eat his head, soused in Egyptian brine." 115
There are, who think that chance is all in all,
That no First Cause directs the eternal ball;
But that brute Nature, in her blind career,
Varies the seasons, and brings round the year:
These rush to every shrine, with equal ease, 120
And, owning none, swear by what Power you please.
Others believe, and but believe, a god,
And think that punishment MAY follow fraud;
Yet they forswear, and, reasoning on the deed,
Thus reconcile their actions with their creed: 125
"Let Isis storm, if to revenge inclined,
And with her angry sistrum strike me blind,
So, with my eyes, she ravish not my ore,
But let me keep the pledge which I forswore.
Are putrid sores, catarrhs that seldom kill, 130
And crippled limbs, forsooth, so great an ill!
Ladas, if not stark mad, would change, no doubt,
His flying feet for riches and the gout;
For what do those procure him? mere renown,
And the starved honor of an olive crown." 135
"But grant the wrath of heaven be great; 'tis slow,
And days, and months, and years precede the blow.
If, then, to punish ALL, the gods decree,
When, in their vengeance, will they come to me?
But I, perhaps, their anger may appease-- 140
For they are wont to pardon faults like these:
At worst, there's hope; since every age and clime
See different fates attend the self-same crime;
Some made by villainy, and some undone,
And this ascend a scaffold, that a throne." 145
These sophistries, to fix a while suffice
The mind, yet shuddering at the thought of vice;
And, thus confirmed, at the first call they come,
Nay, rush before you to the sacred dome:
Chide your slow pace, drag you, amazed, along, 150
And play the raving Phasma, to the throng.
(For impudence the vulgar suffrage draws,
And seems the assurance of a righteous cause.)
While you, poor wretch, suspected by the crowd,
With Stentor's lungs, or Mars', exclaim aloud: 155
"Jove! Jove! will naught thy indignation rouse?
Canst thou, in silence, hear these faithless vows?
When all thy fury, on the slaves accurst,
From lips of marble or of brass should burst!--
Or else, why burn we incense at thy shrine, 160
And heap thy altars with the fat of swine,
When we might crave redress, for aught I see,
As wisely of Bathyllus as of thee!"
Rash man!--but hear, in turn, what I propose,
To mitigate, if not to heal, your woes; 165
I, who no knowledge of the schools possess,
Cynic, or Stoic, differing but in dress,
Or thine, calm Epicurus, whose pure mind
To one small garden every wish confined.
In desperate cases, able doctors fee; 170
But trust your pulse to Philip's boy--or me.
If no example of so foul a deed
On earth be found, I urge no more: proceed,
And beat your breast, and rend your hoary hair;
'Tis just:-for thus our losses we declare; 175
And money is bewailed with deeper sighs,
Than friends or kindred, and with louder cries.
There none dissemble, none, with scenic art,
Affect a sorrow, foreign from the heart;
Content in squalid garments to appear, 180
And vex their lids for one hard-gotten tear:
No, genuine drops fall copious from their eyes,
And their breasts labor with unbidden sighs.
But when you see each court of justice thronged
With crowds, like you, by faithless friendship wronged, 185
See men abjure their bonds, though duly framed,
And oft revised, by all the parties named,
While their own hand and seal, in every eye,
Flash broad conviction, and evince the lie;
Shall you alone on Fortune's smiles presume, 190
And claim exemption from the common doom?
--From a white hen, forsooth, 'twas yours to spring,
Ours, to be hatched beneath some luckless wing!
Pause from your grief, and, with impartial eyes,
Survey the daring crimes which round you rise; 195
Your injuries, then, will scarce deserve a name,
And your false friend be half absolved from blame!
What's he, poor knave! to those who stab for hire,
Who kindle, and then spread, the midnight fire?
Say, what to those, who, from the hoary shrine, 200
Tear the huge vessels age hath stamped divine,
Offerings of price, by grateful nations given,
And crowns inscribed, by pious kings, to heaven?
What to the minor thieves, who, missing these,
Abrade the gilded thighs of Hercules, 205