CANTO IV.

There is something dubious in the syntax, as well as in the sentiment; for donec may refer either to pauci, or to tenemus; and has omnes allude either to the inhabitants of Elysium, or to those of the adjacent purgatorial hell. But two things are evident: Firstly, that Virgil, contrary to his practise, is obscure here, and secondly, that there is no deciding from the passage as to whether Elysium was to be an eternal abode for its denizens, or whether they were at last to obtain their apotheosis and become enumerated among those few (such as Romulus) whom the Pagan Creed (in this far more parsimonious than the Roman Catholic one) taught, beyond all doubt, to be saints, not in Elysium, but in a celestial home, whether under the title of Dei, or Semidei (1). Whatever was Vir◄ gil's private opinion, he probably chose to avoid precision on a matter not expressly defined by the established religion of his Country. Dante, in a situation not dissimilar, followed his example; and had too good taste to prefer the decisive inferences of church-men, to the mild, liberal, noble indecision of the Church itself.

I. - IG.

The line

Quique pii vates et Phobo digna locuti (2)

(1) Ollos quos endo cælo merita vocaverint. De Legibus. Lib. Cap. 8.

(2) Aeneid. Lib. vi. v. 66a.

CANTO IV

was certainly to be understood as including Homer; but was not that generic eulogy rather meagre in the mouth of a man who had drawn on him so lavishly as Virgil? And who thus gave Macrobius a just occasion to affirm that the Aeneid was nothing but a mirror reflecting the Iliad and Odyssey (1). Dante is more grateful to his illustrious predecessors (2). His giving the poetic Sovereignity to Homer is only a confirmation of general opinion; nor do I believe that there will be any objection started to the rank assigned to Horace, or Ovid: but the one which Lucan is here made to occupy has been subjected to bitter criticism.

Whatever be the decision as to the epic superiority of the Pharsalia, its author was dear to Dante -as the panegyrist of liberty; and no doubt but in his this moral destination would have enhaneyes ced the value of even inferior poetry. But whatever

(1) Omne opus Virgilianum velut de quodam Homerici Operis speculo formatum est. Saturnalia. Lib. v. Cap. 2.

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(2) That he should award Poets precedence above all the Heroes, and Philosophers that are to appear, may be condemned: but be it re collected firstly, that it is unjust to argue from an abuse; and secondly that heavenly poetry, which has been so abused by its minor followers, was always in its chiefs, Homer, Virgil, Tasso, Milton, etc, an incentive to virtue; and thirdly, that it is an historical fact that they were Poets who shed the earliest light of knowledge throughout the world as is still testified by those oldest of books, the Bible, and the Iliad and Odyssey: for, in the language of Strabo, it is impossible to be a good poet without being first a good man' —šu oíov Te αγαθον γενεσθαι ποιητὴν, μὴ προτερον γενηθέντα ἄνδρα ἀγαθὸν. Lib. 1. "Nor are any of the nobler poets false to this cause my Lord Shaftesbury with great truth. Characteristics, Vol. 1. p. 121.

"

— says

CANTO IV.

be the degree assigned on the critical scale to the poetry Lucan left behind, he was himself a poet of the very first order, a sovereign genius, a most sublime enthusiast, whose blemishes are all deducible from a defect too easily removed, that of being very young, a writer whom some have not scrupled to prefer to Virgil (1), and who would possibly have really surpassed Virgil, had he been allowed time to chasten the brilliancy of his fancy. His daring genius and incredible assiduity ( for, although cut off scarce in his twenty-seventh year he left above ten literary works), the irony of his dedication to Nero, and the intrepidity which, in such a court of slaves and under such a ferocious tyrant, engaged him to pronounce a panegyric upon freedom (the cause to which he at last made the libation of his blood), the memory of his Uncle, and the manner of both their murders, a Sage bleeding to death amid his secretaries, the other a juvenile poet expiring slowly while reciting the beautiful verses which he had long previously composed on a wounded soldier whose vital stream was, like his own, ebbing eaque illi suprema vox fuit (2): almost every circumstance about Lu can's fate conspires to insure him, our tender regard. Yet according to the Berlin Critics he was little better than a demon, and his Muse was truly infernal: the Pharsalia being an invective

(1) Andres, Letteratura T. 2, p. 126~30.

(2) Taciti Ann. Lib. xv. Cap. 79.

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against absolute power, and even praising the regicide Brutus (1).' Now, as to preferring a Republic to a military despotism, I do think it is su perfluous to defend either Lucan, or his admirer, Dante. M. Merian might possibly have meant to imitate the banter of the dedication of the Pharsalia, and to praise the sentiments which he appears to condemn but this can be perceptible to his intimate friends alone, whereas the generous aim of the philosopher's nephew could scarcely have been dubious to any but those totally unworthy of perceiving it; besides which, no military master of the last century can be compared for a moment with the murderer of Brittanicus. So that in this case aiso (of concealed encomium) it would have become M. Merian to have testified less violence in speaking of one, whom he secretly revered and to whom he must have been conscious of being inferior in even political courage. As to the fall of Casar, it were sufficent for me to remark that those who blame Lucan's sentiments on that head, 'can have no reason to complain of Dante; for he severely condemns Brutus and Cassius, as we shall find: although he did not consider this difference of opinion to be a ground for denying the young author of the Pharsalia his poetical pre-eminence.

(1) Un poëte détest ble qui blaspheme contre la famille royale... La Pharsale n'est qu'une invective contre le pouvoir absolu et le panegyrisme de l'esprit républicain. Le regicide Brutus . ment applaudi. Merian, Mem. de l'Acad. de Berlin. 1778.

...

y est haute

CANTO IV.

In truth both as to the slaying of Cæsar and to the conduct of Brutus, there was, is, and will be a pardonable diversity of judgment amongst the best men. Even allowing the perpetual Dictator to have been the noblest Character of all antiquity, he was the immediate destroyer of the established Constitution of his native land: and whoever be lieves that that constitution might have still survived, may think that (as a traitor only the more dangerous from being seemingly virtuous) he was avowedly guilty of an offence always held capital; that it was an aggravation of his offence, if he had so terrified or corrupted the lawful Magistrates that the laws, though not extinct, were silent; and infine that if he lived in acknowledged defiance of law, and had rendered justice so powerless, that she was evidently unable to put her sentence. against him in execution by her usual Officers and ordinary means, the right of executing it by any possible means devolved upon every citizen, as in the case of a fearful outlaw. That precisely Brutus should have been that executioner, against his benefactor, perhaps his father, will to most people appear an infringement of the first of laws, the law of Nature. But those, who can without horror commemorate the tremendous equity of the elder Brutus, may remark that his descendent bore a name which bound him to the most splendid sacrifices; that the freedom acquired at such a bloody price by his family had a peculiar claim