The Art of Poetry: an Epistle to the Pisos

Horace having, after the example of his master Aristotle, slightly mentioned the first rise of Tragedy in the form of a Choral Song, subjoining an account of the Satyrick Chorus, that was soon (mox etiam) combined with it, proceeds to speak particularly of the Iambick verse, which he has before mentioned generally, as the measure best accommodated to the Drama. In this instance, however, the Poet has trespassed against the order and method observed by his philosophical guide; and by that trespass broken the thread of his history of the Drama, which has added to the difficulty and obscurity of this part of his Epistle. Aristotle does not speak of the Measure, till he has brought Tragedy, through all its progressive stages, from the Dithyrambicks, down to its establishment by Aeschylus and Sophocles. If the reader would judge of the poetical beauty, as well as logical precision, of such an arrangement, let him transfer this section of the Epistle [beginning, in the original at v. 251. and ending at 274.] to the end of the 284th line; by which transposition, or I am much mistaken, he will not only disembarrass this historical part of it, relative to the Grascian stage, but will pass by a much easier, and more elegant, transition, to the Poet's application of the narrative to the Roman Drama,

The English reader, inclined to make the experiment, must take the lines of the translation from v. 268. to v. 403, both inclusive, and insert them after v. 418.

In shameful silence loft the pow'r to wound.

It is further to be observed that this detail on the IAMBICK is not, with strict propriety, annext to a critical history of the SATYR, in which, as Aristotle insinuates insinuates, was used the Capering Tetrameter, and, as the Grammarians observe, Trisyllabicks.

394.—PISOS! BE GRAECIAN MODELS, &c.]

Pope has imitated and illustrated this passage.

Be Homer's works your study and delight,
Read them by day, and meditate by night;
Thence form your judgment, thence your maxims bring,
And trace the Muses upwards to their spring.
Still with itself compar'd, his text peruse!
And let your comment be the Mantuan Muse!

    Essay on Criticism.

404.—A KIND OF TRAGICK ODE, UNKNOWN BEFORE, THESPIS, 'TIS SAID, INVENTED FIRST. IGNOTUM Tragicae GENUS INVENISSE CamaenaeDicitur, &c.

It is surprising that Dacier, who, in a controversial note, in refutation of Heinsius, has so properly remarked Horace's adherence to Aristotle, should not have observed that his history of the Drama opens and proceeds nearly in the same order. Aristotle indeed does not name Thespis, but we cannot but include his improvements among the changes, to which the Critick refers, before Tragedy acquired a permanent form under AEschylus. Thespis seems not only to have embodied the CHORUS, but to have provided a theatrical apparatus for an itinerant exhibition; to have furnished disguises for his performers, and to have broken the continuity of the CHORUS by an Interlocutor; to whom AEschylus adding another personage, thereby first created Dramatick Dialogue; while at the same time by a further diminution of the CHORUS, by improving the dresses of the actors, and drawing them from their travelling waggon to a fixt stage, he created a regular theatre.

It appears then that neither Horace, nor Aristotle, ascribe the origin of Tragedy to Thespis. the Poet first mentions the rude beginning of Tragedy, (carmen tragicum) the Goat-song; he then speaks of the Satyrick Chorus, soon after interwoven with it; and then proceeds to the improvements of these Bacchic Festivities, by Thespis, and AEschylus; though their perfection and final establishment is ascribed by Aristotle to Sophocles. Dacier very properly renders this passage, On dit que Thespis fut le premier jui inventa une especi de tragedie auparavant inconnue aux Grecs. Thespis is said to be the first inventor of a species of Tragedy, before unknown to the Greeks.

Boileau seems to have considered this part of the Epistle in the same light, that I have endeavoured to place it.

La Tragedie informe & grossiere au naissant n'etoit qu'un simple Choeur, ou chacun en danfant, et du Dieu des Raisins entonnant les louanges, s'essorçoit d'attirer de fertiles vendanges. la le vin et la joie eveillant les esprits, du plus habile chantre un Bouc étoit le prix. Thespis sut le premier, qui barbouillé de lie, promena par les bourgs cette heureuse folie; et d'acteurs mal ornés chargeant un tombereau, amusa les passans d'un spectacle nouveau. aeschyle dans le Choeur jetta les personages; d'un masque plus honnéte habilla les visages: sur les ais d'un Theatre en public exhaussé, fit paroitre l'acteur d'un brodequin chaussé.

L'art poetique, chant troisieme.

417.—the sland'rous Chorus drown'd In shameful silence, lost the pow'r to wound.

Chorusque turpiter obticuit, sublato jure nocendi.

"Evidently because, though the jus nocendi was taken away, yet that was no good reason why the Chorus should entirely cease. M. Dacier mistakes the matter. Le choeur se tût ignominuesement, parce-que la hi reprimasa licence, et que ce sut, à proprement parler, la hi qui le bannit; ce qu' Horace regarde comme une espece de siétrissure. Properly speaking, the law only abolished the abuse of the chorus. The ignominy lay in dropping the entire use of it, on account of this restraint. Horace was of opinion, that the chorus ought to have been retained, though the state had abridged it of the licence, it so much delighted in, of an illimited, and intemperate satire, Sublatus chorus fuit, says Scaliger, _cujus illae videntur esse praecipuae partet, ut potissimum ques liberet, laedertnt."

Notes on the Art of Poetry._ If Dacier be mistaken in this instance, his mistake is common to all the commentators; not one of whom, the learned and ingenious author of the above he excepted, has been able to extract from these words any marks of Horace's predilection in favour of a Chorus, or censure of "its culpable omission" in Comedy. De Nores expresses the general sense of the Criticks on this passage.

[Turpiter.] Quia lex, declaratâ Veteris Conaetdiae scriptorum improbitate, a maledicendi licentiâ deterruit.—Sicuti enim antea summâ cum laude Vetus Comediae, accepta est, ita postea summa est cum turpitudine vetantibus etiam legibus repudiata, quia probis hominibus, quia sapientibus, quia inte*s maledixerit. Quare Comaediae postea conscriptae ad hujusce Veteris differentiam sublato choro, novae appellatae sunt.

What Horace himself says on a similar occasion, of the suppression of the Fescennine verses, in the Epistle to Augustus, is perhaps the best comment on this passage.

—quin etiam lex
Paenaque lata, malo quae nollet carmine quenquam—
describi: vertere modum formindine fustis
ad bene dicendum delectandumque redacti.

421.–Daring their Graecian masters to forsake,
And for their themes domestick glories take.

Nec minimum meruere decus, vestigia Graeca
Ausi deserere, & celebrare domestica facta.

The author of the English Commentary has a note on this passage, replete with fine taste, and sound criticism.

"This judgment of the poet, recommending domestic subjects, as fittest for the stage, may be inforced from many obvious reasons. As, 1. that it renders the drama infinitely more affecting: and this on many accounts, 1. As a subject, taken from our own annals, must of course carry with it an air of greater probability, at least to the generality of the people, than one borrowed from those of any other nation. 2. As we all find a personal interest in the subject. 3. As it of course affords the best and easiest opportunities of catching our minds, by frequent references to our manners, prejudices, and customs. And of how great importance this is, may be learned from hence, that, even in that exhibition of foreign characters, dramatic writers have found themselves obliged to sacrifice sacrifice truth and probability to the humour of the people, and to dress up their personages, contrary to their own better judgment, in some degree according to the mode and manners of their respective countries [Footnote: "L'etude égale des poëtes de différens tems à plaire à leurs spectateurs, a encore inssué dans la maniere de peindre les caracteres. Ceux qui paroissent sur la scene Angloise, Espagnols, Françoise, sont plus Anglois, Espagnols, ou François que Grecs ou Romains, en un mot que ce qu'ils doivent être. II ne faut qu'en peu de discernement pour s'appercevoir que nos Césars et nos Achilles, en gardant même un partie de leur charactere primitif, prennent droit de naturalité dans le païs où ils sont transplantez, semblables à ces portraits, qui sortent de la main d'un peintre Flamand, Italien, ou François, et qui portent l'empreinte du pais. On veut plaire à sa nation, et rien ne plait tant que le resemblance de manieres et de enie." P. Brumoy, vol. i. p. 200.] And, 4. as the writer himself, from an intimate acquaintance with the character and genius of his own nation, will be more likely to draw the manners with life and spirit.

"II. Next, which should ever be one great point in view, it renders the drama more generally useful in its moral destination. For, it being conversant about domestic acts, the great instruction of the fable more sensibly affects us; and the characters exhibited, from the part we take in their good or ill qualities, will more probably influence our conduct.

"III. Lastly, this judgment will deserve the greater regard, as the conduct recommended was, in fact, the practice of our great models, the Greek writers; in whose plays, it is observable, there is scarcely a single scene, which lies out of the confines of Greece.

"But, notwithstanding these reasons, the practice hath, in all times, been but little followed. The Romans, after some few attempts in this way (from whence the poet took the occasion of delivering it as a dramatic precept), soon relapsed into their old use; as appears from Seneca's, and the titles of other plays, written in, or after the Augustan age. Succeeding times continued the same attachment to Grecian, with the addition of an equal fondness for Roman, subjects. The reason in both instances hath been ever the same: that strong and early prejudice, approaching somewhat to adoration, in favour of the illustrious names of those two great states. The account of this matter is very easy; for their writings, as they furnish the business of our younger, and the amusement of our riper, years; and more especially make the study of all those, who devote themselves to poetry and the stage, insensibly infix in us an excessive veneration for all affairs in which they were concerned; insomuch, that no other subjects or events seem considerable enough, or rise, in any proportion, to our ideas of the dignity of the tragic scene, but such as time and long admiration have consecrated in the annals of their story. Our Shakespeare was, I think, the first that broke through this bondage of classical superstition. And he owed this felicity, as he did some others, to his want of what is called the advantage of a learned education. Thus uninfluenced by the weight of early prepossession, he struck at once into the road of nature and common sense: and without designing, without knowing it, hath left us in his historical plays, with all their anomalies, an exacter resemblance of the Athenian stage, than is any where to be found in its most processed admirers and copyists.

"I will only add, that, for the more successful execution of this rule of celebrating domestic acts, much will depend on the aera, from whence the subject is taken. Times too remote have almost the same inconveniences, and none of the advantages, which attend the ages of Greece and Rome. And for those of later date, they are too much familiarized to us, and have not as yet acquired that venerable cast and air, which tragedy demands, and age only can give. There is no fixing this point with precision. In the general, that aera is the fittest for the poet's purpose, which, though fresh enough in pure minds to warm and interest us in the event of the action, is yet at so great a distance from the present times, as to have lost all those mean and disparaging circumstances, which unavoidably adhere to recent deeds, and, in some measure, sink the noblest modern transactions to the level of ordinary life."

Notes on the Art of Poetry.

The author of the essay on the writings and genius of Pope elegantly forces a like opinion, and observes that Milton left a list of thirty-three subjects for Tragedy, all taken from the English Annals.

423.—_Whether the gown prescrib'd a stile more mean,
or the inwoven purple rais'd the scene.

Vel qui praetextas, vel qui docuere togatas._

The gown (Toga) being the common Roman habit, signisies Comedy; and the inwoven purple (praetexta) being appropriated to the higher orders, refers to Tragedy. Togatae was also used as a general term to denote all plays, which the habits, manners, and arguments were Roman; those, of which the customs and subjects were Graecian, like the Comedies of Terence, were called Palliatae.

429.—But you, bright heirs of the Pompilian Blood, Never the verse approve, &c.

Vos, O Pompilius Sanguis, &c.

The English commentary exhibits a very just and correct analysis of this portion of the Epistle, but neither here, nor in any other part of it, observes the earnestness with which the poet, on every new topick, addresses his discourse the Pisos; a practice, that has not passed unnoticed by other commentators.

[On this passage De Nores writes thus. Vos O Pompilius Sanguis!] Per apostrophen sermonem convertit ad pisones, eos admonens, ut sibi caveant ab bujusmodi romanorum poetarum errore videtur autem eos ad attentionem excitare dum ait, Vos O! et quae sequntur.

434.—Because DEMOCRITUS, &c.] Excludit sanos Helicone poetas Democritus.

De Nores has a comment on this passage; but the ambiguity of the Latin relative renders it uncertain, how far the Critick applies particularly to the Pisos, except by the Apostrophe taken notice of in the last note. His words are these. Nisi horum democriticorum opinionem horatius hoc in loco refutasset, frustra de poetica facultate in hac AD PISONES EPISTOLA praecepta literis tradidisset, cùm arte ipsâ repudiatâ, ab his tantummodo insaniae & furori daretur locus.

443.—Which no vileCUTBERD'S razor'd hands profane. Tonfori LYCINO.]

Lycinus was not only, as appears from Horace, an eminent Barber; but said, by some, to have been created a Senator by Augustus, on account of his enmity to Pompey.

466.—ON NATURE'S PATTERN TOO I'LL BID HIM LOOK, AND COPY MANNERS FROM HER LIVING BOOK.]

Respicere examplar vitae, morumque jubebo doctum imitatorem, & veras hinc ducere voces.

This precept seeming, at first sight, liable to be interpreted as recommending personal imitations, De Nores, Dacier, and the Author of the English Commentary, all concur to inculcate the principles of Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero, shewing that the truth of representation (verae voces) must be derived from an imitation of general nature, not from copying individuals. Mankind, however, being a mere collection of individuals, it is impossible for the Poet, not to found his observations on particular objects; and his chief skill seems to consist in the happy address, with which he is able to generalize his ideas, and to sink the likeness of the individual in the resemblance of universal nature. A great Poet, and a great Painter, have each illustrated this doctrine most happily; and with their observations I shall conclude this note.