POLITE LITERATURE. 



Art. I. The Punic Passage in Plautus, collated with parallel Passages of the 

 Hebrew Scriptures. By the Rev. James Hamilton, A.M. of Trinity 

 College, Dublin. 



Read 29th June, 1835. 



" In lis explicandis multi hactenus frustra sudarunt. Magno molimine rem aggressi, doctis non satisfecerunt ; qui 

 eos Hannoni Pceno affingere multa dictitant de quibus nunquam cogitavit." 



It has been remarked respecting literature in general, that its value may be 

 characterized as that of an historical cabinet, preserving the forms of thought, 

 feeling, and expression of men of different ages and nations, but of passions and 

 circumstances more or less like to our own; and that it is this which gives the 

 charm to the productions of poetry, history, and eloquence, whether ancient or 

 modern, foreign or domestic. 



To this inherent interest and value, attaching generally to the classical 

 remains of antiquity, there would seem in the drama of Plautus which contains 

 the Punic passage, to be superadded the peculiar piquancy arising'from curiosity ; 

 such as might be excited by some strange natural production, or antique work of 

 art, if in the latter there should be an inscription In a character difficult to 

 decypher, or in the former a coalescence of natural substances not usually com- 

 bined, of which one ingredient, in itself valuable, is rendered still more so by 

 having attached to and cohering with it another of heterogeneous quality, and at 

 the same time both " rich and rare." 



Thus Imbedded in one of those productions which were the delight of the 

 Roman literary world,* and affording a specimen of the thoughts, feelings, and 



* Musas Plautino sermone locuturas fuisse si Latine loqui vellent. 



QuiNTiLiAN, /n*<ti«<. Ora<. lib. X. cap. 1. 

 A 2 



