Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry | Page 9

than you as king.
SATIRE IV.
EUPOLIS ATQUE CRATINUS.
Cratinus, Aristophanes, and all?The elder comic poets, great and small,?If e'er a worthy in those ancient times?Deserved peculiar notice for his crimes,?Adulterer, cut-throat, ne'er-do-well, or thief,?Portrayed him without fear in strong relief.?From these, as lineal heir, Lucilius springs,?The same in all points save the tune he sings,?A shrewd keen satirist, yet somewhat hard?And rugged, if you view him as a bard.?For this was his mistake: he liked to stand,?One leg before him, leaning on one hand,?Pour forth two hundred verses in an hour,?And think such readiness a proof of power.?When like a torrent he bore down, you'd find?He left a load of refuse still behind:?Fluent, yet indolent, he would rebel?Against the toil of writing, writing WELL,?Not writing MUCH; for that I grant you. See,?Here comes Crispinus, wants to bet with me,?And offers odds: "A meeting, if you please:?Take we our tablets each, you those, I these:?Name place, and time, and umpires: let us try?Who can compose the faster, you or I."?Thank Heaven, that formed me of unfertile mind,?My speech not copious, and my thoughts confined!?But you, be like the bellows, if you choose,?Still puffing, puffing, till the metal fuse,?And vent your windy nothings with a sound?That makes the depth they come from seem profound.
Happy is Fannius, with immortals classed,?His bust and bookcase canonized at last,?While, as for me, none reads the things I write.?Loath as I am in public to recite,?Knowing that satire finds small favour, since?Most men want whipping, and who want it, wince.?Choose from the crowd a casual wight, 'tis seen?He's place-hunter or miser, vain or mean:?One raves of others' wives: one stands agaze?At silver dishes: bronze is Albius' craze:?Another barters goods the whole world o'er,?From distant east to furthest western shore,?Driving along like dust-cloud through the air?To increase his capital or not impair:?These, one and all, the clink of metre fly,?And look on poets with a dragon's eye.?"Beware! he's vicious: so he gains his end,?A selfish laugh, he will not spare a friend:?Whate'er he scrawls, the mean malignant rogue?Is all alive to get it into vogue:?Give him a handle, and your tale is known?To every giggling boy and maundering crone."?A weighty accusation! now, permit?Some few brief words, and I will answer it:?First, be it understood, I make no claim?To rank with those who bear a poet's name:?'Tis not enough to turn out lines complete,?Each with its proper quantum of five feet;?Colloquial verse a man may write like me,?But (trust an author)'tis not poetry.?No; keep that name for genius, for a soul?Of Heaven's own fire, for words that grandly roll.?Hence some have questioned if the Muse we call?The Comic Muse be really one at all:?Her subject ne'er aspires, her style ne'er glows,?And, save that she talks metre, she talks prose.?"Aye, but the angry father shakes the stage,?When on his graceless son he pours his rage,?Who, smitten with the mistress of the hour,?Rejects a well-born wife with ample dower,?Gets drunk, and (worst of all) in public sight?Keels with a blazing flambeau while 'tis light."?Well, could Pomponius' sire to life return,?Think you he'd rate his son in tones less stern??So then 'tis not sufficient to combine?Well-chosen words in a well-ordered line,?When, take away the rhythm, the self-same words?Would suit an angry father off the boards.?Strip what I write, or what Lucilius wrote,?Of cadence and succession, time and note,?Reverse the order, put those words behind?That went before, no poetry you'll find:?But break up this, "When Battle's brazen door?Blood-boltered Discord from its fastenings tore,"?'Tis Orpheus mangled by the Maenads: still?The bard remains, unlimb him as you will.
Enough of this: some other time we'll see?If Satire is or is not poetry:?Today I take the question, if 'tis just?That men like you should view it with distrust.?Sulcius and Caprius promenade in force,?Each with his papers, virulently hoarse,?Bugbears to robbers both: but he that's true?And decent-living may defy the two.?Say, you're first cousin to that goodly pair?Caelius and Birrius, and their foibles share:?No Sulcius nor yet Caprius here you see?In your unworthy servant: why fear ME??No books of mine on stall or counter stand,?To tempt Tigellius' or some clammier hand,?Nor read I save to friends, and that when pressed,?Not to chance auditor or casual guest.?Others are less fastidious: some will air?Their last production in the public square:?Some choose the bathroom, for the walls all round?Make the voice sweeter and improve the sound:?Weak brains, to whom the question ne'er occurred?If what they do be vain, ill-timed, absurd.?"But you give pain: your habit is to bite,"?Rejoins the foe, "of sot deliberate spite."?Who broached that slander? of the men I know,?With whom I live, have any told you so??He who maligns an absent friend's fair fame,?Who says no word for him when others blame,?Who courts a reckless laugh by random hits,?Just for the sake of ranking among wits,?Who feigns what he ne'er