ARGUMENT OF THE SIXTH SATIRE
URSIDIUS POSTHUMUS is contemplating marriage, and to him Juvenal, under colour of dissuading him from his intention, addresses in this satire a long indictment of women. Open vice, malice and cruelty, pride and pedantry, extravagance and superstition, are the main heads of the charges brought; and though the various sections may have little other connection, they are united by their common subject-tbe wickedness and worthlessness of the female sex. The satire is, in fact, a picture-gallery of bad women, embracing all degrees of fault, from gossiping to murder.
CREDO Pudicitiam Saturno rege moratam
In terris visamque diu, quum frigida parvas
Praeberet spelunca domos ignemque laremque
Et pecus et dominos communi clauderet umbra;
Silvestrem montana torum quum sterneret uxor
Frondibus et culmo vicinarumque ferarum
Pellibus, haud similis tibi, Cynthia, nec tibi, cujus
Turbavit nitidos exstinctus passer ocellos,
Sed potanda ferens infantibus ubera magnis
Et
saepe horridior glandem ructante marito.
Quippe aliter tunc, orbe novo coeloque recenti,
Vivebant homines, qui rupto robore nati
Compositive luto nullos habuere parentes.
Multa pudicitiae veteris vestigia forsan
Aut aliqua exstiterint et sub Jove; sed Jove nondum
Barbato, nondum Graecis jurare paratis
Per caput alterius, quum furem nemo timeret
Caulibus aut pomis et aperto viveret horto.
Paulatim deinde ad superos Astraea recessit
Hac comite, atque duae pariter fugere sorores.
Antiquum et vetus est alienum, Postume, lectum
Concutere atque sacri Genium contemnere fulcri.
YES, I believe that CHASTITY was known,
And prized on earth, while Saturn fill'd the throne;
When rocks a bleak and scanty shelter gave,
When sheep and shepherds throng'd one common cave,
And when the mountain wife her couch bestrew'd
With skins of beasts, joint tenants of the wood,
And reeds, and leaves pluck'd from the neighbouring tree :-
A woman, Cynthia, far unlike to thee,
Or thee, weak child of fondness and of fears,
Whose eyes a sparrow's death suffused with tears:
But strong, and reaching to her burly brood
Her big-swoll'n breasts, replete with wholesome food,
And rougher than her husband, gorged with mast,
And frequent belching from the coarse repast.
For when the world was new, the race that broke,
Unfather'd, from the soil or opening oak,
Lived most unlike the men of later times,
The puling brood of follies and of crimes.
Haply some trace of Chastity remain❜d,
While Jove, but Jove as yet unbearded, reign'd:
Before the Greek bound, by another's head,
His doubtful faith; or men, of theft in dread,
Had learn'd their herbs and fruitage to immure,
But all was unenclosed, and all secure!
At length Astrea, from these confines driven,
Regain'd, by slow degrees, her native heaven;
With her retired her sister in disgust,
And left the world to rapine, and to lust.
'Tis not a practice, friend, of recent date,
But old, establish'd, and inveterate,
To climb another's couch, and boldly slight
The sacred Genius of the nuptial rite :
Omne aliud crimen mox ferrea protulit aetas:
Viderunt primos argentea saecula moechos.
Conventum tamen et pactum et sponsalia nostra
Tempestate paras, jamque a tonsore magistro
Pecteris et digito pignus fortasse dedisti.
Certe sanus eras! Uxorem, Postume, ducis?
Dic, qua Tisiphone, quibus exagitare colubris?
Ferre potes dominam, salvis tot restibus, ullam?
Quum pateant altae caligantesque fenestrae?
Quum tibi vicinum se praebeat Aemilius pons?
Sed placet Ursidio lex Julia: tollere dulcem
Cogitat heredem, cariturus turture magno,
Mullorumque jubis et captatore macello.
Quid fieri non posse putes, si jungitur ulla
Ursidio si moechorum notissimus olim
Stulta maritali jam porrigit ora capistro,
Quem totiens texit perituri cista Latini?
Quid? quod et antiquis uxor de moribus illi
Quaeritur. O, medici, mediam pertundite venam !
All other crimes the Age of Iron curst;
But that of Silver, saw adulterers first.
Yet thou, it seems, art eager to engage
Thy witless neck, in this degenerate age!
Even now, thy hair the modish curl is taught,
By master-hands; even now, the ring is bought;
Even now-thou once, Ursidius, hadst thy wits,
But thus to talk of wiving!-O, these fits!
What more than madness has thy soul possest?
What snakes, what Furies, agitate thy breast?
Heavens! wilt thou tamely drag the galling chain,,
While hemp is to be bought, while knives remain?
While windows woo thee so divinely high,
And Tiber and the Æmilian bridge are nigh?-
"O, but the law," thou criest, "the Julian law, Will keep my destined wife from every flaw; Besides, I die for heirs.” Good! and for those, Wilt thou the turtle and the turbot lose, And all the dainties, which the flatterer, still, Heaps on the childless, to secure his Will?
But what will hence impossible be held,
If thou, old friend, to wedlock art impell'd?
If thou, the veriest debauchee in town,
With whom wives, widows, every thing went down,
Shouldst stretch the unsuspecting neck, and poke
Thy foolish nose into the marriage yoke?
Thou, famed for scapes, and, by the trembling wife,
Thrust in a chest so oft, to save thy life!-
But what! Ursidius hopes a mate to gain,
Frugal, and chaste, and of the good old strain:
Alas, he's frantick! ope a vein with speed,
And bleed him copiously, good doctor, bleed.
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