Nec vestri sum juris ego; securáque tutus 110 At tibi, chare pater, postquam non æqua merenti Posse referre datur, nec dona rependere factis, Sit memorâsse satis, repetitáque munera grato Percensere animo, fidæque reponere menti. Et vos, O nostri, juvenilia carmina, lusus, Si modò perpetuos sperare audebitis annos, Et domini superesse rogo, lucémque tueri, Nec spisso rapient oblivia nigra sub Orco; Forsitan has laudes, decantatúmque parentis Nomen, ad exemplum, sero servabitis ævo*. 115 120 * Such productions of true genius, with a natural and noble consciousness anticipating its own immortality, are seldom found to fail. T. WARTON. Ad Salsillum, Poetam Romanum, ægrotantem*. SCAZONTES. O MUSA, gressum quæ volens trahis claudum, Nec sentis illud in loco minus gratum, 5 * Giovanni Salsilli had complimented Milton at Rome in a Latin tetrastich, for his Greek, Latin, and Italian, poetry. Milton, in return, sent these elegant Scazontes to Salsilli when indisposed. T. WARTON. Ver. 1. O Musa, gressum quæ volens trahis claudum,] Mr. Bowle here cites Angelinus Gazæus, a Dutch poet, in Pia Hilaria. Antv. 1629. p. 79. "Subclaudicante tibiâ redi, Scazon." It is an indispensable rule, which Milton has not here always observed, that the Scazon is to close with a spondee preceded by an iambus. T. WARTON. Mr. Bowle adds from the Affanie of Ch. Fitz-Geoffrey, L. ii. sign. F. 3. b. 1601. Scazontes. "Adeste Scazon, melleum genus metri, "Suavè claudicans Iambicum carmen." Milton, however regardless of the indispensable Latin Canon, might perhaps think himself countenanced by the licence admitted into Greek Scazons. See Hephæstion. TODD. Ver. 4. Quàm cùm decentes flava Deiope &c.] As the Muses sung about the altar of Jupiter, in Il Pens. v. 47. This pagan theology is applied in Paradise Lost; of the angels, B. v. 161. "and with songs, "And choral symphonies, day without night, Ver. 5. Alternat] Compare Par. L. B. v. 162, and the note on the word alternate. TODD. Adesdum, et hæc s'is verba pauca Salsillo O dulce divûm munus, O Salus, Hebes Querceta Fauni, vósque rore vinoso 10 15 20 25 Ver. 23. O dulce divûm munus, &c.] I know not any finer modern Latin lyrick poetry, than from this verse to the end. The close which is digressional, but naturally rises from the subject, is perfectly antique. T. WARTON. Libentèr audis,] So, in Epitaph. Damon. 209. "Sive æquior audis Diodatus." He has transferred this classical expression into Par. Lost, B. iii. 7. Where see the note. TODD. Ver. 27. Querceta Fauni, &c.] Faunus was one of the deities Colles benigni, mitis Evandri sedes, Nec in sepulchris ibit obsessum reges, brought by Evander into Latium, according to Ovid, Fast. B. v. 99. This is a poetical address to Rome. T. WArton. Ver. 28. mitis Evandri sedes,] The epithet mitis is finely characteristick of Evander. T. WARTON. Ver. 33. Ipse inter atros emirabitur lucos &c.] Very near the city of Rome, in the middle of a gloomy grove, is a romantick cavern with a spring, where Numa is fabled to have received the Roman laws from his wife Egeria, one of Diana's Nymphs. The grove was called nemus Aricinum, and sometimes Lucus Egeria et Camœnarum, and the spring Fons Egeria. See Ovid's Fast. iii. 275. And, when Numa died, Egeria is said to have retired hither, to lament his death. See Ovid, Metam. xv. 487. On these grounds Milton builds the present beautiful fiction, that Numa, still living in this dark grove in the perpetual contemplative enjoyment of his Egeria, from thence will listen with wonder to the poetry of the neighbouring bard. This place is much frequented in sultry weather by the people of Rome, as a cool retreat. See Montfauc. Diar. Ital. c. xi. p. 152. edit. 1702. Milton might have visited it while at Rome. T. WARTON. Ver. 38. Nec in sepulchris ibit obsessum reges, Nimiùm sinistro laxus irruens loro;] This was Ho race's inundation of the Tiber, Od. i. ii. 18. |