by the forensic special pleading and word-fencing which is an occasional flaw in the dramatic art of Sophocles, and a pervading mannerism in that of the younger poet. The impression of grave political deliberation is left on the mind by some of the fragments of Ennius more effectually than by anything uttered in the councils of gods or men in the Aeneid. But it is in the greatest of modern epics that the full force of intellect and feeling animating grave councils of state is most grandly idealised. The speeches in Virgil, though they want the intellectual power and the majestic largeness of utterance of those in Milton, are, like his, stately and dignified in expression; they are disfigured by no rhetorical artifice of fine-spun argument or exaggerated emphasis; they are rapid with the vehemence of scorn and indignation, fervid with martial pride and enthusiasm, or, occasionally, weighty with the power of controlled emotion. They have the ring of Roman oratory, as it is heard in the animated declamation of Livy, and sometimes seem to anticipate the reserved force and 'imperial brevity' of Tacitus. They give a true voice to 'the high, magnanimous Roman mood,' and to the fervour of spirit with which that mood was associated. And this effect is sometimes increased by the use which the polished poet of the Augustan Age makes of the grave, ardent, but unformed utterances-'rudes et inconditae voces '--of the epic and tragic poets of the Republic. The descriptive faculty of Virgil is quite unlike that of Homer, but yet it has great excellences of its own. In the Iliad and Odyssey man appears 'vigorous and elastic such as poetry saw him first, such as poetry would ever see him1;' and the outward world is described in the clear forms and the animated movement which impress themselves immediately on the sense and mind of men thus happily organised. Virgil too presents to us the varied spectacle of human life and of the outward world under many impressive aspects. But these aspects of things do not affect the mind with the immediate 1 Landor's Pentameron. DESCRIPTIVE FACULTY 411 impulse which the natural man receives from them, and of which he retains the vivid picture in his mind. As in his pastoral poems and in the Georgics Virgil seems to abstract from the general aspect of things the characteristic sentiment which Nature inspires in particular places and at particular times, and to see the scene which he describes under the influence of that sentiment, so in the Aeneid various human 'situations' are conceived under the influence of some sense of awe or wonder, of beauty or pathos, of local or antique association; and the whole description is so presented as to bring this central interest into prominent relief. The thought of the whole situation, not the sequence of events in time or causal connexion, is what determines the grouping and subordination of details. Thus in the description of the storm in Book i., the dominant feeling by the light of which the circumstances are to be realised is that of sudden and overwhelming power in the elements and of man's impotence to contend against them. In the description of the harbour in which the ships of Aeneas find refuge we feel the sense of calm and peace after storm and danger. In the interview between Venus and her son the impression left on the mind is that of a mysterious supernatural grace enhancing the charm of human beauty, such as is produced by the pictorial representations of religious art. We seem to look on the rising towers and dwellings of Carthage with that joyful sense of wonder and novelty with which the thought of the beginning of great enterprises, or of the discovery of unknown lands, and the first view of ancient and famous cities, such as Rome or Venice, appeal to the imagination. In the second Book the effect of the whole representation is enhanced by the sentiment of awe and mystery with which night, and darkness, and the intermittent flashes of light which break the darkness, impress the mind. Thus as a prelude to the terrible and tragical scenes afterwards represented, the apparition of Hector comes before Aeneas in the deepest stillness of the night Tempus erat quo prima quies mortalibus aegris Then follow the confused sights and sounds of battle, like those of the VUKTOμaxía in the seventh Book of Thucydides and of that in the Vitellian war of Tacitus,-the spectacle revealed by the light of the burning city Sigaea igni freta lata relucent 2; the vivid gleams in which the death of Priam, the cowering figure of Helen, the majestic forms of the Olympian gods taking part in the work of destruction, are for a moment disclosed out of the surrounding darkness, the alarm and bewilderment of the escape from the house of Anchises and of the vain attempt of Aeneas to recover the lost Creusa Horror ubique, animos simul ipsa silentia terrent 3. The third Book is pervaded by the feeling of the sea,-not as in the Odyssey of its buoyant and inexhaustible life, nor yet of the dread which it inspired in the earliest mariners,—but in that more modern mood in which it unfolds to the traveller the animated spectacle of islands and coasts famous for their beauty or their historic and legendary associations. In the fifth Book, as is pointed out by Chateaubriand, the effect of the limitless and monotonous prospect of the open sea in producing a sense of weariness and melancholy, such as that expressed in 'The Lotus-eaters ' 'but evermore Most weary seem'd the sea, weary the oar, is profoundly felt in the passage— At procul in sola secretae Troades acta 1 'It was when their first sleep begins to weary mortals.' 2 "The broad waters of Sigaeum reflect the fire.' 3 'There is dread on every side, while the very silence awes the mind.' But some way off in a lonely bay the Trojan women apart were It was seen how the sense of supernatural awe adds to the In somnis ferus Aeneas: semperque relinqui Ire viam, et Tyrios deserta quaerere terra1. Thus too the mind is prepared for the spectacle revealed in the Descent into Hell by the awful sublimity of the Invocation Di quibus imperium est animarum umbraeque silentes 2. The description of the funeral rites of Pallas produces that complex impression of sadness and solemnity mixed with proud memories and thoughts of the pomp and circumstance of war which affects men in the present day, when witnessing the spectacle of the funeral of some great soldier who has died full of years and honour Post bellator equus positis insignibus Aethon It lacrimans guttisque umectat grandibus ora. In the employment of illustrative imagery Virgil is much more sparing than Homer. The varied forces of Nature and of animal life supplied materials to the Greek poet by which to enhance the poetical sense of the situation which he de weeping for their lost Anchises, and as they wept were gazing on the deep"Ah, to think that so many dangerous waters, so vast an expanse of sea remained still for them, the weary ones! was the cry of all.' In her dreams Aeneas himself fiercely drives her before him in her frenzy; and she seems ever to be left all alone, ever to be going uncompanioned on a long road, and to be searching for her Tyrians on a desert land.' 2 'Powers whose empire is over the spirits of the dead, and ye silent shades.' 3 Behind his war-horse Aethon, with all his trappings laid aside, goes weeping, wetting his face with great drops. Others bear his spear and shield-the rest of his armour Turnus keeps-then follow in mournful array the Trojans, and all the Tyrrhenian host, and the Arcadians with arms reversed.' scribes; and all these forces are apprehended by him with a vivid feeling of wonder, and presented to the imagination with a truthful observation of outward signs, and with a sympathetic insight into their innermost nature. Virgil is not only more sparing in the use of these figures; he is also tamer and less inventive in their application. In those drawn from the life of wild animals he, for the most part, reproduces the Homeric imagery, though we note as one touch of realism in them that the wolf, familiar to Italy, frequently takes the place of the lion, which was probably still an object of terror in Western Asia at the time when Homer lived. Another class of images reproduced from Homer is that of those in which a mortal is compared to an immortal, as at i. 498 Qualis in Eurotae ripis, aut per iuga Cynthi, Exercet Diana choros, etc., though in this some variations are introduced from a simile in Apollonius. Another passage of the same kind is immediately derived from the Alexandrine poet— Qualis, ubi hibernam Lyciam Xanthique fluenta1, etc. There is, however, another class of 'similes' used by Virgil in his epic, after the example of the Alexandrines, which can scarcely be said to fulfil the function of a poetical analogy, but merely to give a realistic outward symbol of some movement of the mind or passions, without any imaginative enhancement of the situation. Such, for instance, is the comparison at vii. 377, etc. of the mind of Amata to a top whipped by boys round an empty court,-a comparison suggested by a passage in Callimachus2; and that again at viii. 22, etc. of the variations of purpose in the mind of Aeneas, produced by the surging sea of cares besetting him, to the variations of light reflected from the water in a copper cauldron,-a comparison directly imitated from Apollonius (iii. 754, etc.). There are others again of 1 iv. 143, etc. Referred to in the 'Parallel Passages' in Dr. Kennedy's notes. 2 Referred to by M. Benoist. |