Page:The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Volume 1, 1854.djvu/37

 On Lucretius. 27 sciret animoque videret is not right; the sense requires it, not scirent fyc. In the exactly parallel construction of v. 183 we have this argument : Before the creation of man, whence came to the gods the idea of man, so that they were able to know and conceive in mind what they wanted to do ? so in the passage we are now considering the reasoning is this : Before the invention of language, whence did the first inventor acquire the faculty of knowing and conceiving in mind what he wanted to do ? Jdcere depending on vellet, as in the other passage. Lachmann's reading seems to me not only weak, but also to anticipate the argument which is introduced in the next verse by item. The inventor had first to conceive the notion himself, next to impart it to others. In order to avoid the hiatus, which Virgil and other poets employ so frequently, Lachmann emends, awkwardly in my opinion, the corrupt verse vi. 755 : Sed natura loci opus efficit ipsa suapte, in this way, Sed natura loci vi ibus officit &c. I would change the position of two letters and read : Sed natura loci ope sufficit ipsa suapte ; ope having its original force, " the nature of the place suffices by its own power," vi, " means ;" so Virgil Mn, I. 600 : Grates persolvere dignas Non opis est nostrae ; and Cicero Att. xrv. 14 : Omni ope atque opera enitar ; &c. Lach- mann seems to be fond of the word ibus; iv. 934 he changes ejus into ab ibus, denying that it can agree with aeris, understood from aeriis auris, although I feel convinced that no Latin poet would hesitate at such a construction, and he himself does not object to genus numanum quorum, ir. 174 ; nor to mortalia scecla followed by unusquisque eorum, v. 990. Again, vi. 759, I would retain the MS. reading: si sint mactata, agreeing with animalia understood out of quadripedes, instead of Lachmann's otiose : si fit mactatus ; thus i. 352, totas agrees with arbores understood out of arbusta, as Lachmann himself admits, and i. 294, I would retain rapidi agreeing with venti understood out of flamina venti. Did space permit, I could say more on this question. To speak of another point which may appear more questionable, the instances in which our MSS. omit ut after fit efficit, #c. are too numerous to permit me to doubt that the poet himself sometimes admitted this construction. Compare what Oudendorp ad Appul. I. p. 30 b says. On what principle Lach- mann refuses to Lucretius the right to use isdem I cannot com- prehend; certainly in n. 693 nulla... isdem should be read, and in