THE BROTHERS. FROM THE PLAYS OF PUBLIUS TERENTIUS AFER. ACT CTED at the funeral games of L. Æmilius Paulus, given by Q. Fabius Maximus and P. Cornelius Africanus. Principal actors, L. Attilius Prænestinus and Minutius Prothimus. The music composed for Tyrian flutes by Placcus, freedman to Claudius. Taken from the Greek of Menander. First acted, L. Ancius and M. Cornelius, consuls. Year of Rome, 593; before Christ, 160. SELECTIONS. SCENE, ATHENS. Enter MICIO. Ho, Storax! Eschinus did not return So that the pranks of youth, which other children Hide from their fathers, I have used my son 'Tis hard in him, unjust and out of reason, And he, I think, deceives himself indeed. Who fancies that authority more firm Founded on force than what is built on friendship; For thus I reason, thus persuade myself: To his own ways again. But he whom kind ness Him also inclination makes your own: I've brought him up, kept, loved him as my How to do this, let him confess he knows not own, Made him my joy and all my soul holds dear, How to rule children. SOSTRATA, CANTHARA. Enter GETA hastily. GETA. We are now So absolutely lost that all the world Joining in consultation to apply Relief to the misfortune that has fallen But why do I delay to tell my mistress This heavy news as soon as possible? (Going.) Sos. Let's call him back. Ho, Geta! CAN. Whosoe'er Environ us at once, we sink beneath them- You are, excuse me. Poverty, oppression, solitude And infamy. Oh what an age is this! Oh wicked, oh vile, race! oh impious man! Sos. (to CANTHARA). Ah! why should Geta seem thus terrified Sos. I am Sostrata. GETA. Where, where is Sostrata? (Turns about.) I sought you, madamImpatiently I sought you-and am glad To have encountered you thus readily. Sos. What is the matter? Why d'ye tremble thus ? H1 HISTORY AND POETRY. FROM THE GREEK OF LUCIAN. ISTORY will not admit the least degree of falsehood. Poetry has its particular rules and precepts; history is governed by others directly opposite. With regard to the former the license is immoderate, and there is scarce any law but what the poet prescribes to himself. When he is full of the deity, and possessed, as it were, by the Muses, if he has a mind to put winged horses to his chariot and drive some through the waters and others over the tops of unbending corn, there is no offence taken; neither if his Jupiter hangs the earth and sea at the end of a chain are we afraid that it should break and destroy us all. If he wants to extol Agamemnon, who shall forbid his bestowing on him the head and eyes of Jupiter, the breast of his brother Neptune and the belt of Mars? The son of Atreus and Erope must be a composition of all the gods; nor are Jupiter, Mars and Neptune sufficient, perhaps, of themselves to give us an idea of his perfection. But if history admits any adulation of this kind, it becomes a sort of prosaic poetry without its numbers or magnificence, a heap of monstrous stories only more conspicuous by their incredibility. He is unpardonable, therefore, who cannot distinguish one from the other, but lays on history the paint of poetry, its flattery, fable and hyperbole; it is just as ridiculous as it would be to clothe one of our robust wrestlers, who is as hard as an oak, in fine purple or some such meretricious garb, and put paint on his cheeks. How would such ornaments debase and degrade him! I do not mean by this that in history we are not to praise sometimes, but it must be done at proper seasons and in a proper degree, that it may not offend the readers of future ages; for future ages must be considered in this affair. In history nothing fabulous can be agreeable, and flattery is disgusting to all readers except the very dregs of the people; good judges look with the eyes of Argus on every part, reject everything that is false and adulterated, and will admit nothing but what is true, clear and well expressed. Translation of THOMAS FRANCKLIN Be circumspect: oft with insidious ken JOHN PHILIPS. I rose; I leaned through woodbines o'er the Shows thee the beauty of the days gone by. lawn: 'Twas early day-right early-and the dawn Waxed like the springtide of a waveless sea Beyond the dark hills and the umber lea, And with the breath of the upcoming day Ten thousand spirits of the blissful May From cowslip slopes, green banks and heathy fells Did come and go like those sweet morningbells. Oh, welcome, golden dawn! and, summer clime, And he too wakes; the glory of the prime Wild bird and dewy flower and tuneful Shines on his brow and in his heart sub chime, lime; Make drunk my sense, and let me dream Through charmed light he sees the illumined that I Am just new-born in some lost isle of joy, spring, With his own joy he hears the skylark sing, ... And the young airs that ripple the treetops Have got their wings from his enchanted hopes; The dazzling dews that on the roses lie, The sunlit streams, are kindled at his eye. With heedless heart he looks across the land, The jocund bells are pealing fast and sweet; Softly they come and go like lovers' sighs; In one glad thought the young and old are met, The simple and the wise. And far as he can see on either hand They reach the woodman in the morning air, fills The teeming vales and robes the summer hills, Are his; but from his tower he only sees One mossy roof half hid roof half hid among the trees: There is the priceless treasure that outweighs The dark-eyed damsel bending o'er the spring, The scholar in dim cloister murmuring; All hopes and memories, all delights and The marriage-bells ring merrily; hark! they praise. ring. And if his heart is plumed with sudden The sun is kissing off from wood-nymphs' Blown from the lips of Fame with echoes From wildflower urns; o'er waving fields of Mine are the sires whom bards have sung, Swift shadows stream away, and wood-notes |