The Roman Poets of the Republic Part 38

The mysterious power there addressed is identified with the Alma Venus of Italian wors.h.i.+p,--the abstract conception of the life-giving impulse, the operations of which are most visible in the new birth of the early spring,--and with the Aphrodite of Greek art and poetry,--the concrete and pa.s.sionate conception of the beauty and charm which most fascinate the senses. But if nothing more was meant in the opening lines of the poem than a fanciful appeal to one of the Deities of the popular belief, it might with justice be said that some of the finest poetry in Lucretius directly contradicted his sincerest convictions. But the language in which she is addressed clearly proves that the 'Alma Venus' of the invocation is not an independent capricious power, separate from the orderly action of Nature. She is emphatically addressed as a Power, present through all the world,--

Caeli subter labentia signa Quae mare navigerum quae terras frugiferentis Concelebras.

She is not only omnipresent, but all-creative,--

Per te quoniam genus omne animantum Concipitur,--

and all-regulative--

Quae quoniam rerum naturam sola gubernas, etc.

Thus under the name, and with some of the attributes of the G.o.ddess of Mythology, the genial force of Nature,--'Natura Naturans' as distinct from the 'rerum summa,' or 'Natura Naturata,'--is apprehended as a living, all-pervading energy, the cause of all life, joy, beauty, and order in the world, the cause too of all grace and accomplishment in man. To this mysterious Power, from which all joy and loveliness are silently emanating, the poet, (remembering at the same time that the friend to whom he dedicates his poem claims especially to be under the protection of that G.o.ddess with whom she is identified), prays for inspiration,--

Quo magis aeternum da dictis, diva, leporem[66].

Here, as in earlier invocations of the Muse, there is a recognition of the truth that the feeling, the imagery, and the words of the poet come to him in a way which he does not understand,--

[Greek: hemeis de kleos oion akouomen, oude ti idmen,]--

and by the gift of a Power which he cannot command. Like Goethe, Lucretius seems to feel that his thoughts and feelings pa.s.s into form and musical expression under the influence of the same vital movement which in early spring fills the world with new life and beauty.

But still true to his philosophy, and remembering the Empedoclean thought[67], which recurs with impressive solemnity in his argument, that this life-giving energy is inseparably united with a destructive energy, and seeing at the same time before his imagination the figures and colouring of some great masterpiece of Greek art, he embodies his conception in a pa.s.sionately wrought picture of the loves of Aphrodite and Ares, and concludes with a prayer that the gracious Power whom he invokes would prevail on the fierce G.o.d of War to grant a time of peace to his country.

If to regard this pa.s.sage as merely an artistic ornament of the poem would be unjust to the sincerity of Lucretius as a thinker, to regard it merely as a piece of elaborate symbolism would be still more unjust to his genius as a poet. It is a truth both of thought and of imaginative feeling that there is a pervading and puissant energy in the world, manifesting itself most powerfully in animate and inanimate creation, when the deadness of winter gives place to the genial warmth of spring,--

Tibi rident aequora ponti Placatumque nitet diffuso lumine caelum;--

manifesting itself also in the human spirit in the form of genius, calling into life new feelings and fancies of the poet, and shaping them into forms of imperishable beauty. Whether consistently or inconsistently with the ultimate tenets of his philosophy, the poet, in this invocation, seems to recognise, behind these manifestations of unconscious energy, the presence of a conscious Being with which his own spirit can hold communion, and from which it draws inspiration.

With similar inconsistency or consistency a modern physicist speaks of 'the impression of joy given in the unfolding of leaf and the spreading of plant as irresistibly suggesting the thought of a great Being conscious of this joy.'

But this puissant and joy-giving energy, personified in the 'Alma Venus genetrix,' is only one of the aspects which the 'Natura daedala rerum' of Lucretius presents to man. She seems to stand to him rather in the position of a task-mistress than of a beneficent Being, ministering to his wants. The G.o.ds receive all things from her bounty,--

Omnia suppeditat porro Natura,[68]--

and the lower animals who 'wage no foolish strife with her' have their wants also abundantly satisfied:--

Quando omnibus omnia large Tellus ipsa parit Naturaque daedala rerum[69].

But to man she is the cause of evil as well as of good; of s.h.i.+pwrecks, earthquakes, pestilence, and untimely death, as well as of all beauty and delight. Sometimes he seems to hear her speaking to him in the tones of stern reproof,--

Denique si vocem rerum Natura repente, etc.[70]

Again he sees her rising up before him like the old Nemesis of Greek religion, and trampling with secret irony on the pride and pomp of human affairs,--

Usque adeo res humanas vis abdita quaedam Opterit et pulchros fascis saevasque secures Proculcare ac ludibrio sibi habere videtur[71].

It is this large conception of Nature which seems to bring the abstract doctrines of Lucretius into harmony with his poetical feelings and his human sensibilities. The poetry of the living world is thus breathed into the dry bones of the Atomic system of Democritus. The unity which the mind strains to grasp in contemplating the universe is thus made compatible with the perception of individual life in everything. The pathos and dignity of human life are enhanced by the recognition of our dependence on this great Power above and around us. The contemplation of this Power affects the imagination with a sense of awe, wonder, and majesty. But with this contemplative emotion a still deeper feeling seems to mingle. Throughout the poem there is heard a deep undertone of solemnity as from one awakening to the apprehension of a great invisible Power,--'a concealed omnipotence,'--in the world. As the imagination of Lucretius is immeasurably more poetical, so is his spirit immeasurably more reverential than that of Epicurus. If by the a.n.a.lysis of his understanding he seems to take all mystery and sanct.i.ty out of the universe, he restores them again by the synthesis of his imagination.

If his work seems in some places to 'teach a truth he could not learn,' this is to be explained partly by the fact that he sometimes leaves the beaten road of Epicureanism for the higher and less defined tracts,--'avia loca,'--along which the mystic enthusiasm of Empedocles had borne him. But partly it may be explained by the fact that the poetic imagination, which was in him the predominant faculty, a.s.serts its right to be heard after the logical understanding has said its last word. The imagination which recognises infinite life and order in the world unconsciously a.s.sumes the existence of a creative and governing Power, behind the visible framework of things. Even the germ of such a thought was more elevating than the popular idolatry and superst.i.tion. The recognition of the majesty of Nature enables Lucretius to contemplate life with a sense both of solemnity and security, while it imparts a more elevated feeling to his enjoyment of the beauty of the world. The belief which he taught and by which he lived is neither atheistic nor pantheistic; it is not definite enough to be theistic. It was like the twilight between the beliefs that were pa.s.sing away, and that which rose on the world after his time,--

[Greek: emos d' out' ar po eos, eti d' amphilyke nyx].

[Footnote 1: 'First, by reason of the greatness of my argument, and because I set the mind free from the close-drawn bonds of superst.i.tion; and next because, on so dark a theme, I compose such lucid verse, touching every point with the grace of poesy.'--i. 931-34.]

[Footnote 2: Of Leucippus, with whose name the theory is also a.s.sociated, very little is known.]

[Footnote 3: 'This terror of the soul, therefore, and this darkness must be dispelled, not by the rays of the sun or the bright shafts of day, but by the outward aspect and harmonious plan of nature.'--i. 146-48.]

[Footnote 4: i. 445-56.]

[Footnote 5: 'The original atoms are, therefore, of solid singleness, composed of the smallest particles in close and compact union, not kept together by any meeting of these particles, but rather powerful by their eternal singleness, from which nature allows no loss by violence or decay, storing them as the seeds of all things.'--i. 609-14.]

[Footnote 6: ii. 297-302.]

[Footnote 7: ii. 549.]

[Footnote 8: ii. 575-76.]

[Footnote 9: 'If we are to suppose the existence of an eternal substance, at the basis of all things, on which the safety of the whole universe rests, lest you find creation resolved into nonent.i.ty.'--ii. 862-64.]

[Footnote 10: 'So soon as the deep rest of death hath fallen upon a man, and the mind and the life have departed from him, there is no loss in his whole frame to be perceived, either in appearance or in weight. Death still presents everything that was before, except the vital sense and the warm heat.'--iii.

211-15.]

[Footnote 11: 'For, not only would all reason come to nought, even life itself would immediately be overthrown, unless you dare to trust the senses.'--iv. 507-8.]

[Footnote 12: i. 135.]

[Footnote 13: 'Since nothing in our body has been produced in order that we might be able to put it to use, but what has been produced creates its own use.'--iv. 834-35.]

[Footnote 14: 'And love impaired their strength, and children, by their coaxing ways, easily broke down the proud temper of their fathers.'--v. 1017-18.]

[Footnote 15: vi. 60-1.]

[Footnote 16: E.g. i. 54; v. 154.]

[Footnote 17: Macaulay.]

[Footnote 18: E.g. i. 694.]

[Footnote 19: iv. 478-79.]

[Footnote 20:

In quae corpora si nullus tibi forte videtur Posse animi iniectus fieri, procul avius erras.--ii. 739-40.]

[Footnote 21: 'But it is necessary that the atoms, in the act of creation, should exercise some secret, invisible faculty.'--i. 778-79.]

[Footnote 22: 'Since on all sides, through all the pores of aether, and, as it were, all round through the breathing-places of the mighty world, a free exit and entrance is given to the atoms.'--vi. 492-94.]

[Footnote 23: 'As feathers, and hair, and bristles are first formed on the limbs of beasts and the bodies of birds, so the young earth then first bore herbs and plants, afterwards gave birth to the generations of living things.'--v. 788-91.]