Persius' First Satire Englished: From an Early Eighteenth-Century Manuscript

In the Bodleian Library, Oxford, are found two manuscript versionsof an unpublished translation of Persius' Satire I, in the same handbut bound into separate collections. The two versions have numerous local differences in wording. Neither of the collections, MS Rawlinson poet. 172 and MS Ballard 50, helps reveal anything of the translation's provenance, since both are assemblages of miscellaneous short manuscripts bound up together, none of which seems to be connected with the Persius text in subject, or to share the same scribal hand.

Anonymous as it may have to remain, this translation is a rarity,and a production of high quality. Its style dates it to in or near the early eighteenth century,¹ and the rarity is a matter of Persius' unpopularity among translators in and beyond this era. Prior to Dryden's complete Persius of 1693 there had appeared no full version of the Satires since Barten Holyday's of 1616; after Dryden there was no further complete verse translation until Thomas Brewster's of 1741. Single satires in verse were rarely published too: between 1616 and 1740 the record for Satire I shows only a single partial rendering, by Charles Gildon (in his Miscellany Poems, 1692). Persius' crabbed reputation – he never 'wrote ten Lines together clearly', says Dryden in the Discourse Concerning Satire – was apparently discouragement enough for most translators.² Veryfew of the amateur productions preserved in commonplace books and similar collections from this period get beyond a short passage.³

The relationship between the two mss – the same hand, but substantive local variants – suggests that one represents an authorial revision of the other. All indications are that the Ballard ms (hereafter B) records second thoughts. For example, a slightly clumsy line 9, 'Persius the Claps of factions proud disdains', is polished into 'Persius the Claps of factious Rome disdains'. In line 102 the Rawlinson ms (hereafter R) has 'like the smooth marble stone' where B sharpens this to 'like the smooth Parian stone' (neither being suggested by the Latin). At 203 the metrically awkward 'vain ignorant Age' (R) becomes 'degen'rate Age' (B). Hence the Ballard ms (fos 29–31) is the basis of the present text.

In this transcription an attempt is made to represent the poem much as it would have appeared had it been prepared for printing in the eighteenth century. Capitalization and spelling are regularized, punctuation adjusted. Italics are introduced for proper names and quotations. In the few cases of poor legibility, R has been used to confirm readings. A particular issue is which of the dialogue's two interlocutors speak which lines; the matter is confused by Persius' occasional presentation of internal debate. Contemporary editions of the Latin discussed how lines should be assigned to speakers in the notes, but did not show speakers in the text. Both B and R indicate changes of speaker consistently, by inserting their initials ('P' for 'Persius', 'M' for 'Monitor'), but not as frequently as seems necessary (perhaps because the names or initials did not conventionally appear in the Latin texts). Nine extra points at which the dialogue seems to switch speaker, going by the sense of the translation, have been editorially noted by supplying initials in square brackets.

Footnotes gloss points of potential difficulty, but in the translation specifically; they do not extend to points of interpretation covered in editions of Persius. For a Latin text I have used Schrevelius' Juvenalis, at Auli Persii Flacci Satyrae (Lugduni Batavorum, 1648).

An English Version of the First Satire of Persius

The Argument

Our Author's Design in this Satire, is to expose the false taste prevailing amongst the Roman Poets and Orators of his time, wherein he takes occasion obliquely to glance at Nero the Roman Emperor, who was not only a Poetaster himself, but the Patron of all vain Pretenders.

P. Persius. M. Monitor

P. How vain is Man! How anxious his Designs!

M. Suppress thy Rage, for who shall read thy Lines?

P. Who shall!

       M. Not one.

            P. Not one vouchsafe a View!

M. Not one, perhaps, or at the most but...