Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 17.djvu/655

* SATINWOOD. 587 SATISFACTION. The former is the better kinil, and is supposed to be the product of a moderate-sized tree, i'ari- narium Guianensis, and probably other species. That from the East Indies is less white in color, and is produced by CliLoroxylon Sweitenia. Bolh are much used by cabinet-makers and for mar- quetry, etc. 1h Florida a kiml of satinwood is produced by Zantho.xylum cribrosum. It is found in the Keys of Florida and JSanto Domingo, Porto Rico, and Bermuda. SATIRE (Lat. salira. sntiira, medley, from miur, full, from sat, eiiou^^li). Tlu' name f;iven by the Koiiians to a species of poetry, of which they claimed to be the inventors. According to grammarians, the complete term was siitura lanx, from which lanx, meaning 'a plate,' drop])ed away. Among the Greeks the satire was called sillos, meaning 'squint-eyed.' A certain number of these silloi, in elegiac verse, were composed by Xenojihanes ( d. about B.C. 500 ), who burlesqued Homer and Hesiod. Some fragments, too. have survived of the silloi, in hexameter verse, of Timon of Phlius (d. B.C. 208), who waged war on the philosophers. In the comedies of Aristophanes satire assumed wide scope. And yet for Western Eurojie, satire dates only from Latin literature. The oldest Roman satires were medleys of scenic 01" dramatic improvisations expressed in vary- ing metres (Livy, vii., 2), like the Fescennine verses (q.v. ), but the sharp banter and rude jocularity of these imwritten efi'usions bore little resemblance, either in form or spirit, to the earnest and acrimonious criticism that formed the essential character of the later satire. The earliest — so far as we know — who wrote saturw were Ennius and Pacuvius; but the metrical mis- cellanies of these authors seem to have been little more than serious and prosaic descriptions, or didactic homilies and dialogues. Lucilius (d. B.C. 103) is universally admitted to be the first who handled men and manners in that peculiar style •which has ever since been recognized as distinctly satirical and an eifective weapon for personal attack. After the death of Lucilius, satire, as well as other forms of literature, languished ; nor do we meet with any satirist of note till the age of Horace, whose verse, though sharp at times, is in the main humorous and playful. Persius fq.v.) resembles Horace in many ways, but is fundamentally more serious and sincere. It is different with Juvenal, somewhat later, for whom satire became a .srrra iiiiliiimitio, a savage onslaught on the open vice of the capital. After Juvenal we have no professed satirist, but of several writers in whom the same element is found. Martial, the epigi-ammatist, is perhaps the most notable. During the Middle Ages the satirical spirit showed itself abundantly in the general literature of France. Italy. Germany, England, and Scot- land. Men who have a claim to the character of satirists, pnr CTCcllrncr. are I'lrich von Hutten, one of the authors of the Epistolw Obscuronim Vironim, Erasmus, Rabelais, William Langland, Skelton, Sir David Lindsay, and George Buchanan. Among the Elizabethans were Nash. Jlarston, Bishop Hall, and Donne. In France, satire as a formal literary imitation of antiquity appeared ■early. Setting aside the Fabliaux. Rutebeuf, .Jean de Meung, and other media'val writers, Vauquelin may be considered one of the founders of modern French satire. The satirical verses of Mottin, of Vol. X VII.— 3S. Sigogne, and of Bcrthclot, of .Matluirin Regnicr, L'Esinniun saliiique of I''ou(|Ueraux, and Lc I'urnassc .so/iri</HC, attributed to Theophile Viaud, are foul in expression, and remind us that at this time a satire was understood to be an obscene work — the seventeenth-century siliolars supposing that the name had something to do with Satyr, and that the style ought to conform to what might tic thought aiipro])rjate to the ety- mology. During the seventeenth and eightei'nth centuries botli England and France produced pro- fessed satirists, who have not been aur[)assed by the best either of their forerunners or their followers. The names of Butler, Dryden, Pope, and Churchill in England, of Boileau and 'ol- tairc in France, are among the greatest. Edward Young and Dr. Johnson were also distinguished satirists. It may be imticed, however, as a dis- tinguisliing cliaracteristic of Dryden, Boileau, Young, Pope, Churchill, and .lohnson, and as a nuirk of the dilTcrence of the times in which they lived, that it is no longer the Church that is as- sailed, but society, political opponents, literary rivals, etc. Swift, Arbuthnot, and Junius were the great prose satirists of their time. Satire in the shape of political S(piibs and lam- poons, is abundant in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Butler's lliidibras is one long caricature of the Puritans; most of the playwrights of the Restoration were royalist sa- tirises — unscrupulous and indecent partisans. Dryden himself was but facile pi-inccps in the company. Andrew Marvel is the most famous name on the side of liberty. The licgr/ms' Opera of the poet Gay is a very fine bit of political satire. GilTord and Wolcot, better known as Peter Pindar, also deserve mention in an histori- cal view, though their intrinsic merits are small. Incom])arably superior to all their contemporaries and among the first order of satirists were Burns and Cowper. ]Ieanwhile in France, since Vol- taire, no great name had appeared, except, per- haps, that of Beranger. In Germany the mo.st conspicuous modern names are those of Rabener, Hagedorn, Kastncr, Lichtenberg, Stolberg, Wie- land, Tieck, Jean Paul, Platen, and. notably, Heine; but none of these adhered strictly to the classic models. Of nineteenth-century satirists in England, the best are Byron, James and Horace Smith, Hunt, Hood, and Browning, in poetry, and Hook, .Jerrold, Thackeray, Disraeli, and Carlyle in [irose. The United States are excel- lently represented by Irving, Lowell, Holmes, Artemus Ward, and Jlark Twain. Recent brilliant examples of the lighter satire are the 'Dooley' papers contributed by F. P. Dunne to various American and F.nglisli journals, and Ashby-Ster- ry's 'Bystanders'. Consult Nettleship, The Ho- man Hatura (Oxford, 1878) ; Keller. Saliir (Kiel, 1888); Hannay, Satire and Satirists (London, 18.54). See the authors and the literature men- tioned in this article; also Buklesque; C.vrica- TIRK: Fahliaix: P.rody. SATIRE MENIPPEE, .sa'ter' ma'n,-.'|i;*i'. See J1i';nii'1'ki;. SATIROMASTIX (from Lat. .^atira. satire + Gk. ^dffTil, mastix, scourge). A comedy by Thomas Dekker (1602) in which Ben Jonson fig- ures as Horace, junior. It is a good-humored retort to Jonson's Poetaster. SATISFACTION. See Accord and Satis- FACTIOX.