PERSIUS, SATIRE I
13"We shut ourselves up and write something grand—one in verse, one in prose—something that will take a vast amount of breath to pant out. This stuff you will some day read aloud to the public, having first lubricated your throat with an emollient wash; you will take your seat on a high chair, well combed, in a new white robe, and with a rakish leer in your eye, not forgetting a birthday sardonyx gem on your finger. Thereupon, as the thrilling strains make their way into the loins, and tickle the inward parts, you may see the burly sons of Rome,[1] quivering in no seemly fashion, and uttering no seemly words. What, you old reprobate? Do you cater for other people's wanton ears?—ears to which, however hardened your hide, you might fain cry 'hold, enough!'"
F. "But what avail study and learning if the yeast, and the wild fig-tree[2] which has sprung up within, are never to break through the bosom and come forth? See our pallid cheeks and aged looks!"[3]
P. "Good heavens! Is all your knowledge to go so utterly for nothing unless other people know that you possess it?"
F. "O but it is a fine thing to have a finger pointed at one, and to hear people say, 'That's the man'! Would you yourself deem it of no account to have been conned as a task by a hundred curly-headed urchins?"
P. "See, now, the sons of Romulus, having well
- ↑ Titos for Titienses, one of the three original Roman tribes, ironically applied to those who prided themselves on their ancient Roman descent. Similarly used are Troiades in 1. 4, Romulidae, 1. 31, and Rhamnes in Hor. A. P. 342.
- ↑ The ferment of poetic inspiration longing for a vent is compared to the sturdy shoot of the wild fig-tree, which finds its way through masonry and dislodges even solid stones (Juv. x. 143).
- ↑ These words refer to the canities, etc., ridiculed in 1. 9 which the Friend accounts for by the hard work of the poet! Some give these words to Persius, with an ironical meaning.
