Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 354, April 1845

Ingressus, Manesque adiit, Regemque tremendum,
Nesciaque humanis precibus mansuescere corda."

"Even to the dark dominions of the night
He took his way, thro' forests void of light,
And dared amidst the trembling ghosts to sing,
And stood before the inexorable king."

They are good verses, and might satisfy an English reader who knew not the original: albeit they do not attain – how should they? – to the sullen weight of dark dread that loads the Latin Hexameters. Look at that – REGEMQUE TREMENDUM! And then, still, the insisting upon something more! To what nameless Powers do they belong – those unassigned hearts, that are without the experience and intelligence of complying with human prayers?

The infatuation —dementia– which, on the verge of the rejoined light, turns back too soon the head of Orpheus towards her who follows him, is by Virgil said to be

"Ignoscenda quidem, scirent si ignoscere Manes!"

A verse awful by the measure which it preserves between the human of the first half —ignoscenda quidem– and the infernal of the second half —scirent si ignoscere Manes. It places before us, in comparison, the Flexible, which lives in sunshine upon the earth – and the Inflexible, which reigns in the gloom of Erebus underneath it.

What does Dryden? He takes down the still, severe majesty of Virgil by too much of the Flexible – by a double dose of humanity.

"A fault which easy pardon might receive,
Were lovers judges, or could Hell forgive."

It is remarkable that he has himself quoted the line of Virgil with great praise, as one that approaches, within measure, to an Ovidian "turn." He has himself overstepped the measure, and made it quite Ovidian.

The four verses which describe the fault of Orpheus, and the perception of it in hell, are unsurpassed: —

"Restitit; Eurydicenque suam jam luce sub ipsâ,
Immemor, heu! victusque animi respexit. Ibi omnis
Effusus labor: atque immitis rupta tyranni
Fœdera: terque fragor stagnis auditus Avernis."

Only note the growing pathos from the beloved name to the naming of the dread act. Eurydicen —suam—jam luce sub ipsâ—immemor—heu!—victusque animi– RESPEXIT. Five links! Look, too, what a long way on in the verse that sin of backward-looking has brought you. There shall hardly be found another verse in Virgil which has a pause of that magnitude at that advance, in the measure. It is a great stretching on of the thought against the law of music, which usually controls you to place the logical in coincidence with the musical – stop; but here you are urged on into the very midst, and beyond the midst, of the last dactyl – a musical sleight which must needs heighten that feeling, impressed by the grammatical structure, of a voluntary delay, – of unwillingness to utter the word fraught with inevitable death – that mortal RESPEXIT! After this, there is here no poured out toil – no clashing and rending – No! here is the deep note of victory – the proclamation sounding out from the abyss that the prize which was carried off is regained. Thrice down – down – as low as the pools of Avernus breaks out a peal —

"Terque fragor stagnis auditus Avernis."

This is the master with whom – and this the language, and this the measure with which – our translator competes – "imparibus armis."

"For, near the confines of ethereal light,
And longing for the glimmering of a sight,
The unwary lover cast his eyes behind,
Forgetful of the law, nor master of his mind.
Straight all his hopes exhaled in empty smoke,
And his long toils were forfeit for a look.
Three flashes of blue lightning gave the sign
Of covenants broke, three peals of thunder join."

The falling off – the failure at the end is deplorable indeed; yet Dryden recovers himself, and much of what follows is very fine.

The outline of the Iliad interests man's everyday heart. A wife carried off – the retaliation – an invasion or siege – a fair captive withheld from ransom – a displeased God sending a plague – a high prince wronged, offended, sullenly withdrawn to his tent – war prosperous and adverse – a dear friend lost and wailed – a general by his death reconciled – that death avenged – a dead son redeemed by his father, and mourned by his people, – To receive all this sufferance into the heart's depths, wants no specific association – no grounding historical knowledge. By virtue of those anthropical elements – which are, by a change of accidents, one to him and you, Homer, who happens to be a Greek, makes you one, and a Trojan too, or rather you are with him in the human regions, and that fact sufficeth for all your soul's desires. But, though no critic, and unversed in the laws of Epos, which by the way are only discoverable in the poem which he created in obedience to them, and that were first revealed to him from heaven by its inspiring genius – nevertheless, you are affected throughout all your being by those laws, and but by them could not have been made "greater than you know," by the Iliad. For the main action, or Achilleid, though you may not know it, has four great steps. From Achilles' wrong by Agamemnon to the death of Patroclus, is a movement of one tenor. From the death of Patroclus to the death of Hector, is an entirely new movement, though causally bound in the closest manner to that antecedent. The Games and Funeral of Patroclus is an independent action. The Restoration of Hector's body is a dependent, and necessarily springing action, having a certain subsistency within itself. To the whole the seat of moving power is the bosom of Achilles. All the parts have perfect inter-obligation. Cut away any one, and there would be not a perilous gash, but a detruncation fatal to the living frame. There is vital integrity from the beginning to the end. Nowhere can you stop till the great poet stops. Then you obtain rest – not glad rest; for say not that the Iliad ends happily. The spirit of war sits on the sepulchral mound of Hector expecting its prey, and the topmost towers of Ilion, in the gloom of doom, lower with the ruining that shall soon hide Mount Ida in a night of dust.

Forbid it, ye muses all! that we should whisper a word in dispraise of Maro. But for what it is, not for what it is not, we love the Æneid. The wafting over sea from an Asiatic to an Italian soil, and the setting there of the acorn, which by the decree of the Destinies shall, in distant ages, grow up into Rome, and the overshadowing Roman Empire – this majestic theme appeals to the reason, and to the reason taught in the history of the world. It is a deliberate, not an impassioning interest. And how dominionless over our sympathy has the glowing and tender-hearted Virgil, perhaps unavoidably, made the Hero, who impersonates his rational interest! How unlike is this Æneas to that Achilles, round whose young head, sacred to glory, Homer has gathered, as about one magnetic centre, his tearful, fiery, turbulent, majestic, and magnanimous humanities!

Confess we must, reluctantly, that Æneas chills the Æneid. It was not that Virgil had embraced a design greater than his poetical strength. But it was in more than one respect unfortunately, unpoetically, conditioned. That political foundation itself is to be made good by aggressive arms; and by tearing a betrothed and enamoured beautiful bride from the youthful and stately chivalrous prince, her lover, slain in fight against the invaders; whilst the poor girl is to be made over to a widower, of whose gallantry the most that we know is his ill-care of his wife, and his running away from his mistress.

And thus, alas! it cannot be denied, the design of the Æneis is carried through without our great natural sympathies, as respects its end – against them as respects its means. An insuperable difficulty! Did Virgil mistake, then, in taking the subject? One hardly dares say so. The national tradition offers to the national Epic poet the national Epic transaction; and he accepts the offer. In doing so he allies by his theme his own to the Homeric Epos. With all this, however, we do feel that fiery, and all-powerful, and all-comprehensive genius projects the outline of the Iliad upon the canvass; whilst in this poetical history of the Trojan plantation in Italy, we can ascribe to the general disposition and invention hardly more than a prudent and skilful intelligence. But the poetical soul, the creative fire then enters to possess the remainder of the task. Was, after all, a pitched battle not exactly the thing in the world the most kindly to the feelings and the best meted to the understanding of the poet, commissioned to renown with verse the people who fought more, and more successful, pitched battles than any other in the world?

Were Virgil to write now, and you had to allot him his theme, what would it be? A romance of knight-errantry? You would allot him none. You would leave him free to the suggestions of his own delicious spirit. But he thought himself bound to the Latin Epos. To speak in true critical severity, the Æneis has no Hero. It has a HEROINE. And who, pray, is SHE? The seven-hilled Queen of the World. Like another Cybele, with her turreted diadem, and gods for her children, in her arms and in her lap. Herself heaven-descended – Imperial Rome.

The two prophetical episodes – the Muster of the pre-existing ghosts before the eyes of the great human ancestor, Anchises, in his Elysium – and those anticipatory narrative Embossings of the Vulcanian shield, become in this view integral and principal portions of the poem. That reviewing beside that Elysian river, of the souls that are to animate Roman breasts, and to figure in Roman chronicles, gave opportunity to Virgil of one Prophecy that mingled mourning with triumph, and triumph with mourning. Victorious over the Punic – victorious over the Gallic foe – carrying to the temple the arms which he, a leader, stripped from a leader – the third consecrator of such spoils – goes Marcellus. But who is He that moves at the side of the hero? A youth, distinguished by his beauty and by his lustrous arms. The Souls throng, with officious tumult, about him – and how much he resembles his great companion! But on his destined brow sits no triumphal lustre – mists and night cling about his head. Who is it? Æneas enquires – and Anchises would fain withhold the reply. It is the descendant of that elder Marcellus; and promises, were fatal decrees mutable, to renew the prowess and praises of his famed progenitor. Fatal decrees might not change, and the nephew of Augustus, the destined successor of his reign, and the hopes of the Romans – OBIIT. You have often wept over Virgil's verses – here are Dryden's: —

"Æneas here beheld, of form divine,
A godlike youth in glittering armour shine,
With great Marcellus keeping equal pace;
But gloomy were his eyes, dejected was his face.
He saw, and wond'ring, ask'd his airy guide,
What and of whence was he, who press'd the hero's side?
'His son, or one of his illustrious name
How like the former, and almost the same!
Observe the crowds that compass him around;
All gaze, and all admire, and raise shouting sound:
But hov'ring mists around his brows are spread,
And night, with sable shades, involve his head.'
'Seek not to know (the ghost replied with tears)
The sorrows of thy sons in future years.
This youth (the blissful vision of a day)
Shall just be shown on earth, then snatch'd away.
The gods too high had raised the Roman state,
Were but their gifts as permanent as great.
What groans of men shall fill the Martian field!
How fierce a blaze his flaming pile shall yield!
What funeral pomp shall floating Tyber see,
When, rising from his bed, he views the sad solemnity!
No youth shall equal hopes of glory give,
No youth afford so great a cause to grieve.
The Trojan honour, and the Roman boast,
Admired when living, and adored when lost!
Mirror of ancient faith in early youth!
Undaunted worth, inviolable truth!
No foe, unpunish'd, in the fighting-field
Shall dare thee, foot to foot, with sword and shield.
Much less in arms oppose thy matchless force,
When thy sharp spurs shall urge thy foaming horse.
Ah! couldst thou break through Fate's severe decree,
A new Marcellus shall arise in thee!
Full canisters of fragrant lilies bring,
Mix'd with the purple roses of the spring;
Let me with funeral flowers his body strow;
This gift which parents to their children owe,
This unavailing gift, at least, I may bestow!'"

Here is an excellent flow. The sorrow and the pride and the public love which are the life of the original, are all taken to heart by the translator, who succeeds in imparting to you the most touching of poetical eulogies. You find, as usually every where, that the vigorous purpose of the original is maintained, and well rendered, but that certain Virgilian fascinations, which – whether they bewitch your heart or your fancy or our ear, you do not know – are hardly given you back. Thus it might be very hard to say what you have found that you cannot forget again, in such a verse as that which introduces to your eye the subject of the more effusive praise.