Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

ness, to which we have alluded, little is known. He seems to have been warm in his attachments and bitter and unrelenting in his resentments. His affection for a brother whom he lost at Troas, and whose loss he often alludes to and seems to have deeply felt, is the most conspicuous as well as the most amiable of his attachments. In respect of literary merits, Catullus unquestionably is to be preferred to all the Latin poets except Virgil and Horace; though he may be inferior to some of them in particular excellencies, and species of composition. His style is easy and graceful, and his language, though sometimes rendered harsh perhaps to a Roman ear by a Greek construction, is pure, often nicely chosen, and always skilfully arranged. No less artful than Ovid, in the selection of circumstances, he conceals his art much better, and never tires by overloading his subject with circumstance and ornament, which sometimes impairs the beauty of Ovid. Not inferior to Tibullus in ease and harmony of numbers, he far surpasses him in energy, and rapid and compact thought, and terseness. He never falls into the cold artificial manner of Propertius, but is ever fresh, natural, and full of life. As a lyric poet, he is decidedly excelled by Horace. Catullus indeed seems not particularly to have cultivated this species of writing, though he has left fair specimens of his powers in it, in the Hymn of the Parcae in the Nuptials of Peleus and Thetis. As a writer of epigrams, he approaches more nearly than Martial the model of the Greek, though inferior to him in point and conceit.

The epigrams of Catullus were not made with an eye to poetical fame, and of course not mainly to their excellence as works of art. They were usually written under some strong excitement of indignation, or thwarted love, or anger or revenge, and so are sometimes coarse and abusive and virulent.

Hardly can a more striking contrast be found, than that of Catullus in the foul tongued invective of his worse epigrams, with himself in the pure and delicate sentiment, the refined thought, and gentle feeling which he manifests elsewhere. Indeed it is the frequent gleams of simple and generous feeling which ever and anon break out, that has given to his writings their charm and enduring power. The poem ad Calvum de Quintilia, is certainly a fine and beautiful thought worthy of the poet in his best hours. The sadness which oppressed him at the untimely death of his brother of which we have a chastened expression in the Inferiae ad Tumulum Fratris, is

alike grateful to the reader and honorable to him. Fenelon says of him in this view, "est au comble de la perfection pour une simplicité passionée."

The opinions of his contemporaries on the merits of this writer are freely expressed. Horace calls him doctum cantare. The epithet by which he was commonly designated was doctus, given him probably, in part from his acquaintance with Grecian literature, which he every where displays, and in part from the accurate finish of his style. The best editions of Catullus, are those of Isaac Voss, Vulpius, Doering and Sillig. The text of this edition is that of Doering with occasional corrections from other editors. In his observations, Voss has shown vast learning and great skill, but often his remarks are mere conjectures, and sometimes capricious, hasty, and groundless. Vulpius has a full commentary, with a copious collection of parallel passages from other authors. His critical acumen was very slight, and his opinion on questions of nice criticism is to be received with caution. His spirit was servile and bends continually to the authority of Voss. Sillig's edition contains a great number of various readings, and whenever he inserts a remark of his own, it is done usually with accurate and balanced judgment.

Of the 146 pages in this volume, the notes alone occupy one third. They are prepared with much judgment and taste, and illustrate to great advantage the geographical and other difficulties of the text. Mr. Hubbard has pursued a course that might well be adopted in relation to some other Latin authors which are but little known in our schools and colleges-that of careful and discriminating selection-holding fast to the good, and casting the bad away. The volume will be a welcome present, we have no doubt, to our classical scholars and public teachers. The mechanical execution is good.

3.-Calmet's Dictionary of the Holy Bible, as published by the late Mr. Charles Taylor, with the fragments incorporated. The whole condensed and arranged in alphabetical order. Seventh Edition. Revised with large additions, by Edward Robinson, D. D., late professor extraordinary of Sacred Literature in the Theol. Sem. Andover. Illustrated with maps and engravings on wood. Boston: Crocker & Brewster, 1835. pp. 1003. Calmet's Dictionary was translated into English by D'Oyly and Colson, and published in 1732, in 3 vols. folio. There are VOL. VII. No. 22.

63

said also to have been versions of it in the Latin, Dutch, Spanish, and Italian languages. But no further edition of it appeared in England until 1797, when it was again published under the direction of the late Mr. Charles Taylor, (an uncle of the well known Jane Taylor,) with considerable retrenchments and additions. The additions were given in a separate volume, under the name of Fragments, and consisted chiefly of discussions and illustrations of oriental life, character, and manners, drawn chiefly from travellers in the East. A second edition of Mr. Taylor's revision was printed in 1800-3; and afterwards a third, from which the Charlestown, Ms. edition of 1812-16, was copied, in 4 vols. 4to. The fourth London edition appeared in 1823, enlarged by a second volume of Fragments; and the fifth edition in 1830, after the death of Mr. Taylor, in 5 vols. 4to., the fifth volume consisting only of the plates.

The principal merit of Mr. Taylor consists in diligently bringing together from a variety of sources, materials which serve to illustrate the antiquities, manners and customs, and geography of Oriental nations. In judgment, he seems to have been decidedly inferior to Calmet, being often fanciful, rash, and inconsistent. In 1832, a sixth London edition appeared, with Taylor's Fragments incorporated with the Dictionary, in one uniform alphabet, with the omission of many prolix discussions, and the whole condensed and reduced to order.

ror.

This last edition forms the basis of Mr. Robinson's work. Of this second American edition, we will now give a brief account. The mechanical execution is without fault. It is one of the best specimens which we have ever seen of the excellent workmanship of the Boston Type and Stereotype Company. After having made use of the volume for more than three years, we do not recollect to have witnessed a single typographical erThe type is distinct, and the paper clear and white. Six maps are introduced, illustrating the country south of Palestine, the passage of the Israelites through the Red Sea, Judea, Jerusalem, Asia Minor and Canaan. These maps were subjected to severe revision, and many errors were corrected which existed in previous drawings. The country between the Dead and Red Seas, the valley of the Ghor, etc. embody the new and interesting facts brought out by Burckhardt, Legh, Seetzen, and others. A great variety of wood cuts are inserted. At the close of the volume, there are found a Jewish calendar, containing a particular account of the Jewish months; a general

chronological table of the Holy Bible, with the chronology both of Dr. Hales and Calmet, occupying nearly fifty pages; tables of weights, measures and money; and Scripture proper names with a notation.

The retrenchments made in the volume relate chiefly to such discussions as Mr. Taylor retained. Many of them appeared to be incorrect and of injurious tendency. Large additions have been made from the field of Biblical and oriental learning so successfully cultivated by the Germans. The journals of travellers in the East have also been much employed. For the amount of labor performed, the reader can consult the articles, Babylon, Egypt, Exodus, Ahasuerus, Canaan, Letters, Poetry, Psalms, and many others. The additions by Mr. Robinson we consider as altogether the most valuable part of the volume. They bear the marks of much learned research and of sound judgment. The work as a whole we regard as indispensable for the clergyman and the enlightened Sabbath school teacher. Nothing has appeared, within our knowledge, which can rightfully displace it; in fact nothing which professes to occupy the same ground. No one will now think of going back to the old editions of Calmet. But few comparatively can resort to German authorities, while an extensive consultation of modern eastern travellers is a laborious, and to most persons, an impracticable undertaking.

The small Bible Dictionary of Prof. Robinson, is, we understand, an original work throughout. It is intended for such as have not the means of purchasing the larger volume. It is entirely faithful and trustworthy in its statements, and just in the proportion given to the various articles.

4.-Publius Virgilius Maro. Boston: Hilliard, Gray & Co., 1836. pp. 304.

This is a small portable edition of Virgil, without note or comment. It is copied from the stereotyped edition of Didot, and embraces, with the text of Heyne, the results of the labors of Heyne, Heinsius, Wakefield, Burmann, etc.

4

5.-De Linguâ Othomitorum Dissertatio. Auctore Emmanuele Naxera, Mexicano, Academiae Literariae Zacatecarum Socio. (Ex quinto tomo Novae Seriei Actorum Societatis Philosophicae Americanae decerptae.) Philadelphia, 1835, 4to.

Don Manoel Naxera, a member of the Literary Society of Zacatecas, has employed a part of the leisure afforded by exile from his native country, in illustrating that language which, among all the radically distinct tongues spoken in Mexico, is the most singular, and, probably, the most ancient. It is called by the tribe to whom it is vernacular, Hyang-hyung, or “the language of those who are sedentary;" while they name themselves Ot'homi, or "the restless;" as if they meant to imply that their language first deserved a name when a part of their people had become stationary, or, in other words, had reached that step in civilization which is so essential to improvement in the arts of civilized life, and among those arts the cultivation of the language which they speak.

The principal settlements of this tribe, or nation, were in the northern part of the great valley, or table-land of Mexico, and in the adjoining mountains, where they occupied a tract extending about 30-miles from the metropolis. Their language has nothing in common with any of its neighbors, except the conjugation of its verbs, manifestly borrowed, as the author thinks, from the Mexicans and Hwastekas. It is virtually monosyllabic, as almost all its polysyllables are clearly compounds; its vowels are often nasal and guttural, and are varied by protraction or intonation. In its grammatical structure, the simplicity of the Ot'homi exceeds even that of the Chinese. Inflections it has none; and fifteen or sixteen insignificant particles, one of which, ya, is subjoined to mark the plural. The numeral, na, (one) serves as a pronoun and an article. Position and the context determine whether a word is verb, noun, adjective, or adverb; but na prefixed forms an abstract noun; sa a neuter adjective. There is no other distinction of gender. The adjective always precedes its noun. The change of tense and person in the verb is expressed by fourteen particles. Each tense seems to have its peculiar imperative. The future, as in Modern Greek, performs the functions of the infinitive.

The author has devoted the second part of his Dissertation to an examination of the Chinese Grammar, for the purpose of showing how completely all its chief peculiarities are found in

[merged small][ocr errors]
« AnteriorContinuar »