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Letters to Dead Authors-Part16_ANDREW LANG(1844-1912)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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The Epicurean is at one with the Stoic at last, and Horace with

Marcus Aurelius. "To go away from among men, if there are Gods, is



not a thing to be afraid of; but if indeed they do not exist, or if

they have no concern about human affairs, what is it to me to live



in a universedevoid of gods or devoid of providence?"

An excellent philosophy, but easier to those for whom no Hope had



dawned or seemed to set. Yes! it is harder than common, Horace, for

us to think of YOU, still glad somewhere, among rivers like Liris



and plains and vine-clad hills, that

Solemque suum, sua sidera norunt.



It is hard, for you looked for no such thing.

Omnes una manet nox



Et calcanda semel via leti.

You could not tell Maecenas that you would meet him again; you could



only promise to tread the dark path with him.

Ibimus, ibimus,



Utcunque praecedes, supremum

Carpere iter comites parati.



Enough, Horace, of these mortuary musings. You loved the lesson of

the roses, and now and again would speak somewhat like a death's



head over your temperate cups of Sabine ordinaire. Your melancholy

moral was but meant to heighten the joy of your pleasant life, when



wearied Italy, after all her wars and civic bloodshed, had won a

peaceful haven. The harbour might be treacherous; the prince might



turn to the tyrant; far away on the wide Roman marches might be

heard, as it were, the endless, ceaseless monotone of beating



horses' hoofs and marching feet of men. They were coming, they were

nearing, like footsteps heard on wool; there was a sound of



multitudes and millions of barbarians, all the North, officina

gentium, mustering and marshalling her peoples. But their coming



was not to be to-day, nor to-morrow, nor to-day was the budding

Empire to blossom into the blood-red flower of Nero. In the lull



between the two tempests of Republic and Empire your odes sound

"like linnets in the pauses of the wind."



What joy there is in these songs! what delight of life, what an

exquisite Hellenic grace of art, what a manly nature to endure, what



tenderness and constancy of friendship, what a sense of all that is

fair in the glittering stream, the music of the waterfall, the hum



of bees, the silvery grey of the olive woods on the hillside! How

human are all your verses, Horace! what a pleasure is yours in the



straining poplars, swaying in the wind! what gladness you gain from

the white crest of Soracte, beheld through the fluttering snowflakes



while the logs are being piled higher on the hearth. You sing of

women and wine--not all wholehearted in your praise of them,



perhaps, for passion frightens you, and 'tis pleasure more than love

that you commend to the young. Lydia and Glycera, and the others,



are but passing guests of a heart at ease in itself, and happy

enough when their facile reign is ended. You seem to me like a man



who welcomes middle age, and is more glad than Sophocles was to

"flee from these hard masters" the passions. In the fallow leisure



of life you glance round contented, and find all very good save the

need to leave all behind. Even that you take with an Italian good-



humour, as the folk of your sunny country bear poverty and hunger.

Durum, sed levius fit patientia!



To them, to you, the loveliness of your land is, and was, a thing to

live for. None of the Latin poets your fellows, or none but Virgil,



seem to me to have known so well as you, Horace, how happy and

fortunate a thing it was to be born in Italy. You do not say so,



like your Virgil, in one splendid passage, numbering the glories of

the land as a lover might count the perfections of his mistress.



But the sentiment is ever in your heart and often on your lips.

Me nec tam patiens Lacedaemon,



Nec tam Larissae percussit campus opimae,

Quam domus Albuneae resonantis



Et praeceps Anio, ac Tiburni lucus, et uda

Mobilibus pomaria rivis. {13}



So a poet should speak, and to every singer his own land should be

dearest. Beautiful is Italy with the grave and delicate outlines of



her sacred hills, her dark groves, her little cities perched like

eyries on the crags, her rivers gliding under ancient walls;



beautiful is Italy, her seas, and her suns: but dearer to me the

long grey wave that bites the rock below the minster in the north;



dearer are the barren moor and black peat-water swirling in tauny

foam, and the scent of bog myrtle and the bloom of heather, and,



watching over the lochs, the green round-shouldered hills.




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