Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 14.djvu/355

 LATIN LANGUAGE 337 The age of Nero. Seneca. iny the 4er. tun- lian. an- tus. indications of the evil effects of the rhetorical schools upon language as well as literature. The leading man of letters was undoubtedly Seneca the younger, &quot;the Ovid of prose&quot;; and his style set the model which it became the fashion to imitate. But striking and popular as it was it could not commend itself to the judgment of sound critics like Quin- tilian, who held firmly to the great masters of an earlier time. He admits its brilliance, and the fertility of its pointed reflexions, but charges the author justly with want of self- restraint, jerkiness, frequent repetitions, and tawdry tricks of rhetoric. He was the worst of models, and pleased by his very faults. In his tragedies the rhetorical elaboration of the style only serves to bring into prominence the frigidity and frequent bad taste of the matter. But his diction is on the whole fairly classical ; he is, in the words of Muretus, &quot; vetusti sermonis diligentior quam quidam inepte fastidiosi suspicantur.&quot; In Persius there is a constant straining after rhetorical effect, which fills his verses with harsh and obscure expressions. The careful choice of diction by which his master Horace makes every word tell is exaggerated into an endeavour to gain force and freshness by the most contorted phrases. The sin of allusiveness, that besefcs SD many young writers, is fostered by the fashion of the day for epigram, till his lines are barely intelligible after repeated reading. Conington happily suggested that this style was assumed only for satiric purposes, and pointed out that when not writing satire Persius is as simple and unaffected as Horace himself. This view, while it relieves Persius of much of the censure which has been directed against his want of judgment, makes him all the more typical a representative of this stage of silver Latinity. In his contemporary Lucan we have another example of the faults of a style especially attractive to the young, handled by a youth of brilliant but ill-disciplined powers. The Pharsalia abounds in spirited rhetoric, in striking epigram, in high sounding declamation; but there are no flights of sustained imagina tion, no ripe wisdom, no self-control in avoiding the exaggerated or the repulsive, no mature philosophy of life or human destiny. Of all the Latin poets he is the least Virgilian, so that Merivale remarks &quot; he had never studied, one is almost tempted to believe that he had never read, Virgil.&quot; It has been said of him that he corrupted the style of poetry, not less than Seneca that of prose, It may be doubted whether his influence was ever great enough to produce such an effect ; it is safer to say that he is the earliest poet in whom the characteristics of the silver Latinity are clearly marked. In the elder Pliny the same tendencies are seen occasion ally breaking out in the midst of the prosaic and inartistic form in which he gives out the stores of his cumbrous erudition. Wherever he attempts a loftier tone than that of the mere compiler, he falls into the tricks of Seneca. The nature of his encyclopaedic subject matter naturally makes his vocabulary very extensive ; but in syntax and general tone of language he does not differ materially from contemporary writers. Quintilian is of interest especially for the sound judgment which led him to a true apprecia tion of the writers of Rome s golden age. He set himself strenuously to resist the tawdry rhetoric fashionable in his own time, and to hold up before his pupils purer and loftier models. His own criticisms are marked by excellent taste, and often by great happiness of expression, which is pointed without being unduly epigrammatic. But his own style did not escape, as indeed it hardly could, the influences of his time ; and in many small points his language falls short of classical purity. There is more approach to the sim plicity of the best models in Frontinus, who furnishes a striking proof that it was rather the corruption of literary taste than any serious change in the language of ordinary cultivated men to which the prevalent style was due. Writing on practical matters the art of war, and the water-supply of Rome he goes straight to the point without rhetorical flourishes ; and the ornaments of style which he occasionally introduces serve to embellish but not to distort his thought. The epic poets of the Flavian age present a striking The contrast to the writers of the Claudian period. As a Flavian strained originality was the cardinal fault of the one school, agc so a tame and slavish following of authority is the mark of the other. The general correctness of this period may perhaps be ascribed (with Merivale) partly to the political conditions, partly to the establishment of professional schools. Teachers like Quintilian must have done much to repress extravagance of thought and language; but they could not kindle the spark of genius, Valerius Flaccus, Epic Silius Italicus, and Papinius Statius are all correct in roets. diction and in rhythm, and abound in learning : but their inspiration is drawn from books and not from nature or the heart ; details are elaborated to the injury of the impression of the whole ; every line is laboured, and over charged with epigrammatic rhetoric. Statius shows by far the greatest natural ability and freshness ; but he attempts to fill a broad canvas with drawing and colouring suited only to a miniature. Juvenal exemplifies the tendencies Juvenal. of the language of his time, as moulded by a singularly powerful mind. A careful study of the earlier poets, especially Virgil and Lucan, has kept his language up to a high standard of purity. His style is eminently rhetorical ; but it is rhetoric of real power. The concise brevity by which it is marked seems to have been the result of a deliberate attempt to mould his natural diffuseness into the form recognized as most appropriate for satire. In his verses we notice a few metrical licences common to his age, especially the shortening of the final -o in verbs, but as a rule they are as correct as they are sonorous. In Martial Martial. the tendency of this period to witty epigram finds its most perfect embodiment, combined with finished versification. The typical prose-writers of this time are Pliny the younger Pliny the and Tacitus. A study of their diction and syntax will best y un c tr disclose the characteristics of the silver Latinity. Some of ai the features of the style of Tacitus are peculiar to himself ; but on the whole the following statement represents the tendencies shared in greater or less degree by all the writers of this period. The gains lie mainly in the direction of a more varied and occasionally more effective syntax ; its most striking defect is a lack of harmony in the periods, of arrangement in words, of variety in particles arising from the loose connexion of sentences. The vocabulary is ex tended, but there are losses as well as gains. Quintilian s remarks are fully borne out by the evidence of extant authorities: on the one hand, &quot;quid quod nihil iam proprium placet, clum parum creditur disertum, quod et alius dixisset&quot; (viii., prooem., 21); &quot;a corruptissimo quoquu poetarum figuras seu translationes mutuamur; turn demum ingeniosi scilicet, si ad intelligendos nos opus sit ingenio &quot; (ib., 25); &quot;sordetomne quod natura dictavit &quot; (ib., 26); on the other hand, &quot;nunc utique, cum haec exercitatio procul a veritate seiuncta laboret incredibili vcrborum fastidio, ac sibi magnam partem sermonis absciderit &quot; (viii. 3, 23), &quot; multa cotidie ab antiquis ficta moriuntur &quot; (ib., 6, 32). A writer like Suetonius therefore did good service in intro ducing into his writings terms and phrases borrowed, not from the rhetoricians, but from the usage of daily life. In the vocabulary of Tacitus there are to be noted : 1. Words borrowed (consciously or unconsciously) from the classical poets, especially Virgil, occurring for the most part also in contemporary prose. Of these Drager gives a list of ninety-five (Syntax und Stil dcs Tacitus, p. 96). 2. Words occurring only, or for the first time, in Tacitus. These according to the same authority number eighty-eight, for the most XiV. - 43