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of passions and faculties, had no existence but what was too metaphysical and abstract for the generality of mankind. It was necessary to identify them with the gods of external nature; and upon this point the spirit of allegory imagined a thousand fantastic relations: for the human mind wishes at least for an appearance of truth. It was natural enough that the god of the sea should be the deity of sailors; the figurative expressions of "an all-seeing eye," and "the rays that dart through the air," might easily cause the sun to be accounted a skilful prophet, and a dexterous archer. But why should the planet Venus be the mother of loves? why should she issue out of the foam of the sea? Let us leave these enigmas to the unfolders of riddles. As soon as the departments of the gods of human nature were settled, they must have engrossed the worship of all mankind. They spoke to the passions and to the heart; while the natural gods, who had not acquired any moral attributes, insensibly fell into contempt and oblivion. So that it is only in the most remote antiquity that I can see any smoke arising from the altars of Saturn.*

LXXIV. The gods, therefore, interested themselves in human affairs. Nothing took place of which they were not the authors. But were they, then, the authors of crime? This consequence frightens us; but a pagan would not hesitate to admit it, and indeed he could not. The gods often inspired vicious designs; that they might suggest them they must needs will, and even love, them. They had not even the resource left of the permission of a small portion of evil in the best constructed system that was possible;† for the evil was not merely permitted, it was authorised; and, besides, the different deities, confined to their respective departments, were very indifferent to a general good that they knew nothing about. Each followed the bent of his own character, and inspired only such passions as they themselves experienced. The god of war was fierce, brutal, and sanguinary; the goddess of prudence was wise, reserved, and insincere; the mother of loves was agreeable, voluptuous, passionate and capricious; cunning and complaisance well suited the god of merchants; and the cries of the wretched delighted the ear of the suspicious tyrant of death, the black god of the infernal regions.

LXXV. A god who is the father of men, is equally so to all; and is unacquainted either with hatred or favouritism. But these partial divinities must have had their favourites. Would they not peculiarly distinguish those whose taste was conformable to their own? Mars could not but love those Thracians whose only occupation was war, and those Scythians whose most delicious drink was the blood of their enemies.§ The goddess of love must have been pleased with the qualities of an inhabitant of Cyprus or Corinth,

* I mean among the Greeks; his worship was preserved for a long time in Italy. Fontenelle, in his Eulogium on M. Leibnitz.

Herodotus, lib. iv. cap. 4, 5; Meziriac, Commentary on the Epistles of Ovid, tom. i. p. 162.

§ Herodotus, lib. iv. cap. 64, 65.

places where every thing breathed of luxury and effeminacy. Gratitude was conjoined with taste. Feelings of preference were due to those people, whose manners formed but a diversified worship of their tutelary deities. The very worship that was paid them always had a relation to their characters. The human victims that expired on Mars' altar,* the thousands of courtesans who prostituted themselves at the temple of Venus,† the ladies of rank, at Babylon, who sacrificed to her their modesty, could not but draw down on these different nations the most distinguished favour of their protectors. But as the interests of nations are not less opposite than their manners, the gods were obliged to adopt the quarrels of their devotees. "What! patiently see that city which has erected to me a hundred temples, fall under the sword of a conqueror? No! rather! So that among the Greeks, a war among mankind always kindled one among the gods. Troy threw all heaven into confusion; the Scamander saw the glittering of Minerva's ægis, witnessed the effects of the arrows drawn from Apollo's quiver, and felt the dreadful trident of Neptune shaking the earth from its lowest foundations. Sometimes the inevitable decrees of fate re-established peace,§ but most generally the different gods mutually agreed reciprocally to abandon each other's enemies ;|| for on Olympus, as well as upon the earth, hatred has always been more powerful than friendship.

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LXXVI. A pure kind of worship would have been but little accordant with such divinities as these. The multitude wanted sensible objects; a figure which should decorate their temples and fix their ideas, and this must of course be the most beautiful of all forms. But which is that? If you ask a man, he will undoubtedly say it is his own; perhaps a bull would give a somewhat different answer. Sculpture attained its highest perfection in subservience to devotion; and the temples were filled with statues of old and young men, women, and children, according to the different attributes ascribed to each of the gods.

LXXVII. Beauty is perhaps founded upon utility alone. The human form is beautiful only because it so perfectly answers the ends

*Herodotus, lib. v. cap. 4, 5; Minutius Felix, Octavius, cap. 25, p. 258; Lucan, Pharsalia, lib. i.; Lactantius, lib. i. cap. 25.

† Strabonis Geographia, lib. viii. p. 378.

They were obliged, once in their life, to prostitute themselves to the first comer, in the temple of Venus. M. de Voltaire, who imposes this obligation upon them once every year, treats it as a foolish fable (ŒŒuvres de Voltaire, tom. vi. p. 24). But Herodotus had travelled in those regions, and M. de Voltaire is too well read in history not to be acquainted with the many similar triumphs that have been gained by superstition over humanity and virtue. What does he think of an auto da fé? I can foresee his answer. Besides, I was not aware that Babylon was the most orderly city in the world. Quintus Curtius describes it to be the most dissolute; Berosus the Babylonian himself, complains that his fellow-citizens, breaking through all the barriers of modesty, lived after the manner of beasts; and the scholiast of Juvenal informs us that in his time they had not at all degenerated. (Quintus Curtius, Gesta Alexandri, lib. v. cap. 1, et Comment. Freinsheimii in loco.)

§ Banier's Mythology, tom. ii. p. 487; Ovid's Metamorphoses, lib. xv. Euripides, Hippolytus, act v. ver. 1327; Ovid's Metamorphoses, passim. Cicero de Naturâ Deorum, lib. i. cap. 27, 28.

for which it was designed. The divine form is the same; and therefore its purposes and defects must be similar. Hence that gross manner of the generation of the gods, who only composed one family like men; hence their feasts of nectar and ambrosia, and the nourishment they derived from the sacrifices; hence also their slumbers and pains. The gods, thus become nothing more than a superior order of men, would sometimes visit the earth, dwell in the temples, recreate themselves with human amusements, be present at the chase and the dance; and sometimes, becoming sensible to the influence of a mortal's charms, give rise to a race of heroes.

LXXVIII. In those great events in which from the performances of a great number of actors, whose views, situations, and characters are different, there arises a unity of action, or rather of effect; perhaps in such cases, their mainspring is to be sought for among general causes alone.

LXXIX. In more private and particular events, the procedure of nature differs greatly from that of the philosophers. With the former there are few effects so simple as not to owe their origin to more than one cause; while our sages in general keep to one cause, which is not only universal but alone. Let us avoid splitting on this rock; and how little complicated soever any action may appear, let us admit its general causes without rejecting design and accident. Sylla abdicated the sovereign power; Cæsar lost it and his life together. Yet their usurpations had been preceded by their victories; and before becoming the most powerful Romans they had been the most renowned. They were closely followed by Augustus, who, though a sanguinary tyrant,§ and suspected of cowardice, the greatest possible crime in the chief of a party,|| yet he attained to the throne, and caused the republicans to forget they had ever been free. But their temper diminishes my surprise. Alike incapable of liberty both under Sylla and under Augustus, they were, however, under the former, ignorant of this fact; but in the time of the latter, civil wars, and two proscriptions more cruel than war itself, had taught them that the republic, sinking under the weight of its own greatness and corruption, could not exist without a master. Besides, Sylla, being the leader of the nobility, fought at the head of those proud patricians, who were very willing to arm him with the sword of despotism to avenge them on their enemies and his own, but would not leave in his hands the power of destroying themselves. They had conquered, not for him, but with him; the speech of Lepidus¶ and the conduct of Pompey** make it very plain that Sylla only preferred descending from the throne to being thrown down from it. But Augustus, after the example of Cæsar,††made use only of those bold adventurers, Agrippa,

* See Julian's Cæsars by Spanheim, p. 257, 258, rem. 857; Aristophanes' Aves; and Lucian nearly throughout.

+ Homer's Iliad, lib. i. ver. 609.

Iliad, lib. v. ver. 335.

§ After the capture of Perusi, he sacrificed three hundred of the principal citizens on an altar erected to the divinity of his father. See Suetonius, lib. ii. cap. 15. ¶ Sallust, Fragmenta, p. 404, edit. Thysii.

|| Suetonius, lib. ii. cap. 16.

** Freinsheimii Supplementum, lib. lxxxix. cap. 26-33.
Taciti Annales, lib. iv. p. 109; Suetonius, lib. ii. cap. 101.

Mæcenas, and Pollio, whose fortune depended on his own, and would have disappeared among an aristocracy of nobles, at discord among themselves, but all combined to overwhelm every fresh aspirant.

LXXX. Several fortunate circumstances, the debauchery of Antony, the weakness of Lepidus, the credulity of Cicero, combined to effect this favourable disposition towards him. The variety of objects entirely prevents me from depicting this subtle government, the chains worn without their weight being perceived, the prince confounded with the citizens, the senate respected even by its master.* Let us then choose a single trait.

Augustus, when master of the revenues of the empire and the riches of the world, always distinguished his own private property from the public treasure. Thus at a small sacrifice he both made his moderation apparent, which left his heirs much less wealth than those of many of his subjects,† and his love to his country, which abandoned to the service of the state two entire patrimonies, and an immense amount of wealth derived from the legacies of his deceased friends.‡

LXXXI. An ordinary degree of penetration is sufficient to discern when an action is at once a cause and an effect. In the moral world this is often the case; or rather it very seldom happens that there are any which do not partake of the nature of both.

The corruption existing in every order of Roman society was produced by the extent of their dominion, and produced the grandeur of the republic.§

But it requires an extraordinary judgment to discern whether two things, which always exist together, and appear intimately connected, do not reciprocally owe their origin to each other.

LXXXII. It is said that the sciences are produced from luxury, and that a civilised people will always be vicious. To this I cannot agree. The sciences are not the offspring of luxury; but both of these have their origin in industry. In the earliest state of the arts, they satisfy the first wants of mankind; when brought to perfection, they procure him new sources of gratification, from the Minerva's shield of Vitellius || to the philosophical discourses of Cicero.

I am impatiently looking for the sequel of the dissertations on this subject, promised us by the Abbé de la Blétérie. The system of Augustus's government, which is so often misunderstood, will there appear clearly depicted, down to its most minute ramifications. The author's reasonings possess great ingenuity and a beautiful freedom, his discussions are not dry, and his expressions have all the graces of a clear and elegant style. Perhaps, a Descartes in history, he reasons a little too much à priori, and establishes his conclusions more on particular authorities than on general inductions; but this is the error of a great genius.

+ After every deduction made of his legacies to the people and to the soldiers, Augustus left Tiberius and Livia only milles quingentes, £1,250,000. The augur Lentulus, who died during his reign, possessed quater millies, £3,333,333. See Suetonius, lib. ii. cap. 101; Seneca de Beneficiis, lib. ii.

Quaterdecies millies, £11,666,666. See Suetonius, lib. ii. cap. 101; and the An

cyran marble.

§ Montesquieu sur la Grandeur des Romains. I make a distinction between the greatness of the Roman dominion and that of the republic; the one consisted in the number of its provinces, the other in that of the citizens.

| Vitellius sent galleys as far as Hercules' Pillars to seek for the rarest fish, with

But in proportion as manners are corrupted by luxury, so much are they softened by science; like the Prayers in Homer, which continually traverse the earth, following after Injustice, to soften the fury of that cruel goddess.*

Such are a few reflections, which to me have appeared well grounded, on the various uses of literature. Happy shall I be if I can impart a taste for it. I should have too high an opinion of myself, if I did not perceive the defects of this essay; and I should entertain too low an one, did I not hope that, in a more mature age, and with more extensive knowledge, I shall find myself better qualified to supply them. It may perhaps be said that these reflections are true, but hackneyed; or that they are new, but paradoxical. What author is fond of criticisms? Nevertheless, the former opinion will displease me the least. The good of the art is much dearer to me than the glory of the artist.

CRITICAL OBSERVATIONS

ON THE

DESIGN OF THE SIXTH BOOK OF THE ÆNEID. THE allegorical interpretation which the Bishop of Gloucester has given of the sixth book of the Æneid, seems to have been very favourably received by the public. Many writers, both at home and abroad, have mentioned it with approbation, or at least with esteem, and I have more than once heard it alleged, in the conversation of scholars, as an ingenious improvement on the plain and obvious sense of Virgil. As such, it is not undeserving of the notice of a candid critic; nor can the enquiry be void of entertainment, whilst Virgil is our constant theme. Whatever may be the fortune of the chase, we are sure it will lead us through pleasant prospects and a fine country.

That I may escape the imputation as well as the danger of misrepresenting his lordship's hypothesis, I shall expose it in his own words. "The purpose of this discourse is to show that Eneas's adventure to the infernal shades, is no other than a figurative description of his initiation into the mysteries; and particularly a very exact one of the spectacles of the Eleusinian."+ This general notion is supported with singular ingenuity, dressed up with an easy yet pompous display of learning, and delivered in a style much fitter for the hierophant of Eleusis, than for a modern critic, who is observing a remote object through the medium of a glimmering and doubtful light:

"Ibant obscuri, solâ sub nocte, per umbram."

which he filled this monstrous dish. If we may believe Dr. Arbuthnot, it cost £765,625. Suetonius in Vitellio, cap. 13; Arbuthnot's Tables, p. 138.

* Μετοπισθ Ατης ἀλεγουσι κιούσαι.

Homer's Iliad, lib. ix. ver. 500.

+ See Warburton's Dissertation, &c. in the third volume of Mr. Warton's Virgil. I shall quote indifferently that Dissertation or the Divine Legation itself.

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