II THE FOLLY OF RUNNING TO EXTREMES MEN seldom keep the golden mean, but run from one extreme to another. Especially may this be illustrated by victims of sensual indulgence and by people guilty of adultery, a vice which has become a shocking feature of the age. This immature and forbidding sketch, coarse and sensational in tone, and doubtless one of Horace's earliest efforts, is closely associated with the Lucilian type of satire. It abounds in personalities, freely handled, and Horace himself (in Sat. i. 4. 92) cites it later as an illustration of the kind of writing which had aroused enmity against the author. Even Maecenas, if we are to believe the scholiasts, is thinly disguised in the Maltinus of 1. 25. In his introduction to this Satire, Lejay has shown how dependent it ultimately is "upon the erotic literature of the Hellenistic period as expressed in the popular Cynic philosophy, in the New Comedy, and in the Anthology" (Fiske, p. 251). There is a striking parallel between it and a poem on love in the Oxyrhynchus Papyri by the Cynic Cercidas of Megalopolis, who lived in the latter part of the third century B.C. See Chapter I. of Powell and Barber's New Chapters in the History of Greek Literature (Oxford, 1921). II. 5 Ambubaiarum collegia, pharmacopolae, mendici, mimae, balatrones, hoc genus omne maestum ac sollicitum est cantoris morte Tigelli : quippe benignus erat. contra hic, ne prodigus esse dicatur metuens, inopi dare nolit amico, frigus quo duramque famem propellere1 possit. hunc si perconteris, avi cur atque parentis praeclaram ingrata stringat malus ingluvie rem, omnia conductis coemens obsonia nummis : sordidus atque animi quod parvi nolit haberi, respondet. laudatur ab his, culpatur ab illis. Fufidius vappae famam timet ac nebulonis, dives agris, dives positis in faenore nummis : 2 quinas hic capiti mercedes exsecat,3 atque quanto perditior quisque est, tanto acrius urget; nomina sectatur modo sumpta veste virili sub patribus duris tironum. maxime " quis non "Iuppiter!" exclamat, simul atque audivit ? “at in se 10 15 pro quaestu sumptum facit hic.4 vix credere possis 1 depellere, II. 2 l. 13 (= Ars Poet. 421) rejected by Sanadon, Holder. 3 exigit E2. 4 facit. Hic? some editors. hic] hoc doy. a The usual rate was one per cent a month, twelve per SATIRE II The flute-girls' guilds, the drug-quacks, beggars, actresses, buffoons, and all that breed, are in grief and mourning at the death of the singer Tigellius. He was, they say, so generous. On the other hand, here's one who, fearing to be called a prodigal, would grudge a poor friend the wherewithal to banish cold and hunger's pangs. Should you ask another why, in his thankless gluttony, he recklessly strips the noble estate of his sire and grandsire, buying up every dainty with borrowed money, he answers that it is because he would not like to be thought mean and of poor spirit. He is praised by some, blamed by others. Fufidius, rich in lands, rich in moneys laid out at usury, fears the repute of a worthless prodigal; five times the interest he slices away from the principal," and the nearer a man is to ruin, the harder he presses him; he aims to get notes-of-hand from youths who have just donned the toga of manhood, and have stern fathers. "Great Jove!" who does not cry as soon as he hears it? but surely he spends on himself in proportion to his gains?" You would hardly believe cent a year, but Fufidius charged five times that rate, and took it in advance as in discounting, so that the sum actually received by the borrower was only forty per cent of the amount borrowed. quam sibi non sit amicus, ita ut pater ille, Terenti 20 fabula quem miserum gnato vixisse fugato inducit, non se peius cruciaverit atque hic. 25 Si quis nunc quaerat "quo res haec pertinet?" illuc: dum vitant stulti vitia, in contraria currunt. Maltinus tunicis demissis ambulat; est qui inguen ad obscenum subductis usque1 facetus. pastillos Rufillus olet, Gargonius hircum. nil medium est. sunt qui nolint2 tetigisse nisi illas quarum subsuta talos tegat instita veste : contra alius nullam nisi olenti in fornice stantem. 30 quidam notus homo cum exiret fornice, “macte virtute esto" inquit sententia dia Catonis : nam simul ac venas inflavit taetra libido, huc3 iuvenes aequum est descendere, non alienas permolere uxores. "nolim laudarier," inquit 35 40 sic me," mirator cunni Cupiennius albi. Audire est operae pretium, procedere recte qui moechis non voltis, ut omni parte laborent, utque illis multo corrupta dolore voluptas atque haec rara1 cadat dura inter saepe pericla. hic se praecipitem tecto dedit; ille flagellis ad mortem caesus; fugiens hic decidit acrem praedonum in turbam, dedit hic pro corpore nummos, hunc perminxerunt calones; quin etiam illud 1 Punctuation after usque, Vollmer. 2 nolunt aD. 3 hac, II. 4 rata E. a In the Heauton Timorumenos, or Self-Tormentor, the father, Menedemus, seized with remorse for his harshness to his son Clinias, punishes himself with hard labour. bi.e., married women who dress as such. how poor a friend he is to himself, so that the father whom Terence's play pictures as having lived in misery after banishing his son, never tortured himself worse than he.a 23 Should one now ask, "What is the point of all this? 'tis this in avoiding a vice, fools run into its opposite. Maltinus walks with his garments trailing low; another, a man of fashion, wears them tucked up indecently as far as his waist. Rufillus smells like a scent-box, Gargonius like a goat. There is no middle course. Some men would deal only with women whose ankles are hidden by a robe with low-hanging flounce; another is found only with such as live in a foul brothel. When from such a place a man he knew was coming forth, "A blessing on thy well-doing!" runs Cato's revered utterance; for when shameful passion has swelled the veins, 'tis well that young men come down hither, rather than tamper with other men's wives." "I should not care to be praised on that count," says Cupiennius, an admirer of white-robed lechery. 37 It is worth your while, ye who would have disaster wait on adulterers, to hear how on every side they fare ill, and how for them pleasure is marred by much pain, and, rare as it is, comes oft amid cruel perils. One man has thrown himself headlong from the roof; another has been flogged to death; a third, in his flight, has fallen into a savage gang of robbers; another has paid a price to save his life; another been abused by stable-boys; nay, once it Roman matrons dressed usually in white. & Cf. Ennius: audire est operae pretium procedere recte |