PREFACE.

PROFESSOR ANTHON assures us that his Virgil contains all that is valuable in the notes of Valpy. The present edition of Valpy professes to contain all that is valuable in the notes of Anthon: I would even add much more besides; for, whereas Anthon says that he has also borrowed from "the latest European editors, such as Nöhlen, Heinrich, Hohler, Thiel, Forbiger, but more especially Heyne and Wagner, I have not only examined some of these authors, but given in a series of rules and observations at the end of the book (as more fully explained in the preface to the notes), the results of a careful study of Jacob's Quæstiones Epicæ, Wagner's Quæstiones Virgilianæ, and the Ars Poetica of Christian Jani.

The way in which I have endeavoured thus to enrich the notes of Valpy is as follows:

Dr. Major has remarked of Professor Anthon "He has shown that the study of the ancient authors may be extended over the wide field of history, geography, antiquities, philology, criticism, and many kindred subjects."

Of this characteristic of Anthon's valuable edition I have endeavoured to avail myself, subject always to three principles, which Dr. Valpy laid

down for his guidance, and to which I attribute the extraordinary success of his work.

First "I have given no unnecessary information, nor abridged the labour of the youthful student in consulting such a dictionary as that of Dr. Lempriere."

Secondly-"Where any difficulty seemed likely to arise, the best information has been diligently sought and applied."

Thirdly"A few grammatical or etymological remarks are interspersed, which may lead the youthful student to think for himself, and may facilitate his future progress in the Latin tongue.”

I would also state that, wherever I have omitted any notes, I have either pointed out the parts of Adam's Roman Antiquities and Lempriere's Classical Dictionary, which would afford more than an equivalent; or else the notes omitted have been such as our experience has proved to be rather perplexing than useful, even to the collegian, much more to the school-boy, because they related to matters better adapted to the professor than the student, and such as could only be rendered intelligible by a lengthened dissertation.

The text of this, as of preceding editions is that of Heyne; subject, however, to the very valuable and universally received emendations of Wagner.

For further information I must refer the reader to the prefatory remarks attached to the notes.

J. P.

June, 1846.

PREFACE

ΤΟ

THE MARGINAL REFERENCES.

THE advantage of marginal references to an edition of Virgil is too obvious for any lengthened argument. I need only allude to the pages of the most valued editions of the Holy Volume; to the wellknown maxim "Every author his own interpreter;" and to the principle implied by Horace :--

"Segnius irritant animum demissa per aurem,
Quam quæ sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus, et quæ
Ipse sibi tradit spectator."

Add to this, the high importance attached to parallel passages, both as the means and test of scholarship, at our public schools and universities, as also that a marginal reference is the only kind of commentary not open to objection, as being crude, out of place, hard to remember, and harder still to digest; unsatisfactorily short, or tediously long; or, which is worse, as superseding the enquiry it

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ought to stimulate. Far from such evils, marginal references cultivate both the taste and judgment, and encourage habits of patient investigation and self-dependance. They place all scholars on even ground, by laying open to every one the sources of knowledge for his own supply, legitimate premises for his own inference, and original data for his own calculations.

The following are the principles upon which the references of this edition have been selected :—

First, That the author be his own interpreter. Thus, it has been attempted to explain difficulties by reference to similar ideas in other words by similar use of the same words-by a repetition of the same idioms-by lines supplying a word of which there is an ellipsis or by giving the compound for which the simple is used. Every passage of acknowledged obscurity is furnished with one or more references, if, indeed, any has been discovered by Heyne, Wagner, or other commen

tators.

Secondly, That all passages be adduced by which Virgil may be supposed to have been influenced either in words or ideas, as well as those passages which he recast or translated, in Homer, Hesiod, Theocritus, and Lucretius.

Aratus, and other authors little known, are omitted, because not generally useful.

Thirdly, That other parallels, when, and only when, really desirable, be collected from Horace,