Page:Juvenal and Persius by G. G. Ramsay.djvu/40

 describes, in the minutest detail, the same vices and the same manner of living; and the correspondence between them acquires a double force from the fact that the two authors looked at these same things from a totally different angle. Juvenal was a moralist; he regarded the vices and follies of his day as affording material for reprobation; Martial looked upon the same facts as affording material for quips and epigrams. Juvenal hardly ever casts off the attitude of a preacher; Martial gives an identical picture of Roman life without a touch ot moral indignation.

But although we cannot but accept Juvenal's account of the corruption of his day as true in the main, it does not follow that it was true of all Rome, and that there was no reverse side to the picture. We know from Pliny, Seneca, and other writers, that there were many quiet, thoughtful and well-conducted homes in Rome, in which a high level of morality was reached, which had no share in the corruptions of the time, and were preparing the ground for that period of philosophical reflection and moral regeneration which distinguished the second century. We may, therefore, console ourselves by the reflection that the castigations of Juvenal, though justified on the whole, referred mainly to what might be called the seamy side of Roman life—a side to which some parallel may be found in our own boasted centres of civilization. xxxvi