Our most indifferent
acts may be matter for secrecy, but whatever we do with
the utmost truthfulness and integrity, by virtue of its pureness,
must be transparent as light.
In the third satire he asks,
"Est aliquid quo tendis, et in quod dirigis arcum
An passim sequeris corvos, testave, lutove,
Securus quo per ferat, atque ex tempore vivis?"
Language seems to have justice done it, but is obviously
cramped and narrowed in its significance, when any meanness
is described.
The truest construction is not put upon
it.
What may readily be fashioned into a rule of wisdom,
is here thrown in the teeth of the sluggard, and constitutes the front of his offence.
Universally, the innocent man
will come forth from the sharpest inquisition and lecturings,
the combined din of reproof and commendation, with a
faint sound of eulogy in his ears.
Our vices lie ever in
the direction of our virtues, and in their best estate are but
plausible imitations of the latter.
Falsehood never attains
to the dignity of entire falseness, but is only an inferior
sort of truth; if it were more thoroughly false, it would
incur danger of becoming true.
"Securus quo pes ferat, atque ex tempore vivit,
is then the motto of a wise man.
For first, as the subtle discernment
of the language would have taught us, with all
his negligence he is still secure; but the sluggard, notwithstanding
his heedlessness, is insecure.
The life of a wise man is most of all extemporaneous,
for he lives out of an eternity that includes all time. He
is a child each moment and reflects wisdom. The far
darting thought of the child's mind tarries not for the
development of manhood ; it lightens itself, and needs
not draw down lightning from the clouds.
When we bask
in a single ray from the mind of Zoroaster, we see how all
subsequent time has been an idler, and has no apology for
itself. But the cunning mind travels farther back than
Zoroaster each instant, and comes quite down to the present
with its revelation . All the thrift and industry of
thinking give no man any stock in life ; his credit with the
inner world is no better, his capital no larger.
He must
try his fortune again today as yesterday.
All questions
rely on the present for their solution. Time measures
nothing but itself:
The word that is written may be postponed,
but not that on the life.
If this is what the occa
sion says, let the occasion say it.
From a real sympathy,
all the world is forward to plrompt him who gets up to live
without his creed in his pocket.
In the fifth satire, which is the best, I find,
"Stat contra ratio, et recretam garrit in aurem.
Ne liceat facere id, quod quis vitiabit agendo."
Only they who do not see how anything might be better
done are forward to try their hand on it . Even the master
workman must be encouraged by the reflection, that his
awkwardness will be incompetent to do that harm, to which his skill may fail to do justice.
Here is no apology for
neglecting to do many things from a sense of our incapacity,
-for what deed does not fall maimed and imperfect
from our hands?-but only a warning to bungle less.
The satires of Persius are the farthest possible from inspired;
evidently a chosen, not imposed subject. Perhaps
I have given him credit for more earnestness than is apparent; but certain it is, that that which alone we can call
Persius, which is forever independent and consistent, was
in earnest, and so sanctions the sober consideration of all.
The artist and his work are not to be separated. The
most wilfully foolish man cannot stand aloof from his folly,
but the deed and the doer together make ever one sober fact .
The buffoon may not bribe you to laugh always at his grimaces; they shall sculpture themselves in Egyptian granite, to
stand heavy as the pyramids on the ground of his character.
T.
