There is however a modern use of the simile which is quite different. If we open Shelley we read

"The golden gates of Sleep unbar

Where strength and beauty, met together,
Kindle their image like a star

In a sea of glassy weather,"

Here there is nothing obvious in the comparison: we should never have thought, without the aid of the poet's superb imagination, of comparing the union of love to a star mirrored in the smooth sea: and yet there is a profound appropriateness, not only in the image, but in all the suggestions of it: the beauty, the isolation from others, the reflection of the brilliance, the infinity, the serenity. Or again,

"Life like a dome of many-coloured glass

Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragments."

Here too the comparison is not at all obvious: it is fetched from far by the poet's deeper insight and quicker sensibility: and it is splendidly illustrative all through: the bright colours compared with the pure white light resemble the chequered shifting imperfect beauties of life compared with the changeless perfection of eternity: the narrow limited dome and the endless vault of heaven give another equally deep contrast: and lastly the perishable glass contrasted with the eternal spaces of the universe.

The more such similes are studied, the richer light is thrown on the comparison: they are not, like Vergil's, poetic miniature pictures to be enjoyed independently; they are profound luminous resemblances, a permanent addition to our fancy and insight, for which we are grateful to the higher gifts of the poet.

I have said so much, to make it clear, that what Vergil aims at in his similes is something quite different (and in one sense far less) than what the modern poet (especially the lyric poet) aspires to; for in order to appreciate the true poetic success of

Vergil, it is clearly necessary to understand his object, and so avoid the mistake of judging him by an erroneous standard.

Note on the Eighth Book.

The general contents of the eighth book have been given in outline in the brief résumé of the narrative on p. 10. The latter books of the Aeneid have been generally rated below the first six, for one reason because there is much more fighting: and the interest of battle is far less in a literary epic, where it must be artificial, than in a primitive epic, where it is natural. At the same time Vergil has used all his immense resources to relieve such monotony.

In this book, as in the seventh, the fighting proper does not begin. We have embassies, and camps, and burnished armour and prancing steeds: but the real gory work is not yet. And the ‘apparel and pageant' of war may no doubt be tiresome; but not in the same way as the butchery. And there is much here that is picturesque. The sailing up the Tiber and the approach to Rome is so: and the description of the Arcadians on their festal day. The tale of Hercules is one of the most vigorous and effective bits of narrative in Vergil: and the poet has taken great pains with it, and polished and elaborated it to perfection. The description of Vulcan's forge, though perhaps it is rather a specimen of ‘epic business' and has not much intrinsic interest, is still most forcibly executed. The speeches are vivid and various, and one of them, Euander's farewell to his son, 'o mihi praeteritos,' &c. (560-583) is of wonderful beauty, and has several of those lines which touch the imagination and haunt the memory, and yet whose charm somehow defies analysis1.

For the national purpose of the poem, again, this book has a great deal that is of weight and significance.

1 Such as

si visurus eum vivo et venturus in unum...

et patrias audite preces...

Even to the

dum curae ambiguae, dum spes incerta futuri...&c.

modern reader the visit of Aeneas to the places of ancient memory in Rome (337) is impressive: and on the Roman reader, who believed in Rome if he believed in anything, this enshrinement of spots consecrated by centuries of association must have had a deeper and stronger effect. And above all the opportunity which the poet makes for himself in the shield of Aeneas is used with skill and success. The idea of describing the moulding of the shield is of course from Homer: but nothing could be more characteristic of the two nations than the contrast between the two shields as painted by the Greek and the Roman poet. On the shield of Achilles (7. 18. 483) we have wrought by the god's hand a bridal procession, a throng in the market, a beleaguered city, an ambush, a fallow field and ploughing team, reapers in the swathe, a vineyard at vintage time, a pasture, a lion hunt, a dance of youths and maidens; and 'great ocean's mighty stream to ring the margin': we have in a word the Greek, with his bright love of life and his deep instinct for the beautiful. On the shield of Aeneas we have the pictured story of early Rome: the wolf and her sucklings, the rape of Sabine women, the league of Rome and Alba, the treachery of Mettius, the revolution against the tyrant kings, Horatius who kept the bridge and Cloelia who swam the river, Manlius and the Gauls: and last we have the battle of Actium, the hard won peace after 100 years of civil war; the youthful victor's triumph, and the submission of the world. The Greek shield is human life: the Roman shield is the greatness of Rome. And the book ends with a grand verse, the climax of a hundred stately lines, telling us how the hero 'lifts upon his shoulders the fame and fates of his sons.'

A word must be said, finally, of the imperfections. The tradition is well known that the poet, being surprised by his last illness before he had revised to his satisfaction his great poem, expressed a wish that it should be burned. This story, precious as a proof of Vergil's ideal standard of workmanship, is to some extent borne out by indications of incomplete polish in the later books.

In the eighth book there are three unfinished lines (41, 469,

536). Not much stress can be laid on these, as, though there are none in the Georgics, they occur in all the books of the Aeneid and in some cases the breaking off is rhetorically effective, and may have been intentional. Still it may reasonably be doubted whether the poet would have left them, if he had had time to complete the work. More clearly open to criticism is such a passage as 134-141, where the long genealogy must have been rather dull even to a Roman reader: and there is something especially unsuccessful about the repetition 'aetherios humero qui sustinet orbes' and 'caeli qui sidera tollit.' There is also a passage (42 sqq.) which shews a certain inconsistency with an earlier part of the poem: see however notes ad loc., where the question is discussed. But in any case these are trifling blemishes.

Note on Vergil's peculiarities of style.

The object of style in literature, apart from the subjectmatter, is to produce effect by successful choice of words. Sometimes the effect is produced by using the simplest words and phrases to express the idea: sometimes by the use of rare or choice words, unusual turns of phrase, stretches of meaning, or even stretches of grammar. The first we may call the simple, the second the elaborate or artificial style. It is useless to ask which is the best: each will suit best in turn the genius of certain writers, the subject of certain poems, certain situations or ideas, and the taste of certain readers: many poets will use them both at different times: and both may be most effective in the hand of a master. And each too has its danger: the simple is liable to fall into bathos and commonplace: the elaborate has a tendency to become turgid, stilted, over-artificial.

Take as an instance of the simple style the well-known line of Wordsworth:—

"Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."

Or this from Milton's Christmas Ode:

"And kings sate still with awful eye,

As if they surely knew their sovran lord was by."

In these none but the commonest words are used, and yet the poetical effectiveness of the style is consummate. Now take as an example of the elaborate style Hamlet's exclamation to the Ghost:

"but tell

Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements."

Or this, from Richard II.:

"Ere my tongue

Shall sound my honour with such feeble using
Or sound so base a parle, my teeth shall tear
The slavish motive of recanting fear," &c.

In these the strength of feeling finds expression in the very strangeness of the language.

These instances will illustrate one form of the contrast between the two styles; and there are many other forms. Shakespeare will supply many illustrations of both: being a dramatist and a genius, he speaks in many voices. So do many if not most poets of the first rank. Wordsworth however is a notable instance of the simplest style: Pindar perhaps the best of the elaborate style. The poets of this century in England, feeling as they did the strength of a reaction against the artificial style of Pope and his followers, produced many examples besides Wordsworth of the simple style, such as Moore, Southey, Campbell, much of Byron and Coleridge, and the whole of Walter Scott. Two of the greatest however, Keats and Shelley, from the gorgeous imagination of the one and the profound inspiration of the other, supply more examples of the elaborate and forcible style.

Now Vergil's poetry belongs largely to this second class. It is true that he can be simple, and often is: he is much too great an artist to ignore any poetic resource. But for the most part he does not aim at expressing his thoughts in the simplest, but rather in the most striking manner. He often employs 'an elaboration of language which disdains or is unable to say a

AEN. VIII.