272 HORACK ON INSANITY. 



dour and elegance of the Roman, poet. And what, after all, has he 

 acquired, that can compensate for the lost opportunity of more fully- 

 evolving his physical powers, and fortifying his constitution against 

 the inroads of future disease ? A knowledge of which, in riper 

 age, a few month's application, under an enlightened system of in- 

 struction, would have given him a far more perfect possession ; and 

 in the attainment of which a raaturer intelligence would then have 

 afforded the most exquisite gratification." 



Of course the weakly stripling would suffer the same martyrdom 

 whether he applied himself to German or Greek, to logarithms or 

 to Latin ; the only question is upon the point of what is to be 

 gained by either, in short, the old query of cui bono ? Now I do 

 not purpose entering into an argument on the value of classical ac- 

 quirements either to the medical practitioner or to students in ge- 

 neral, though, in the course of such an argument, I could enlist on 

 my side many of England's best and wisest ; but, after these few 

 preliminary observations, will endeavour to shew that a great deal 

 of both moral and medical philosophy may be acquired from the 

 writings of the lyric bard of Rome. 



One of the chief characteristics of a great poet, of whatever coun- 

 try, is an intimate knowledge of human nature. The face of a 

 country may alter in appearance under the influence of increasing 

 civilization, languages and religions may be modified or lost, the 

 manners and customs of a people may gradually change, but human 

 passions and human affections remain unchanging and unchange- 

 able. Ambition, love, hatred, avarice, revenge, are the same in the 

 barbarian as in civilized man, though clothed in a different dress 

 and seen in a different light. In vice and virtue themselves time 

 has made no alteration, though it has changed the fashion of their 

 garb ; the same passions produce the same effects in London and in 

 Paris, as in ages gone by they produced in Athens and in Rome ; 

 and the picture which Horace drew of the vices and follies of his 

 day requires but little change to render it a faithful representation 

 of the present time. Horace himself held the same opinions, and 

 tells us, in his Epistle to Lollius, that he was in the habit of read- 

 ing Homer for the sake of the moral philosophy which it contained. 



" Trojani belli scriptorem, maxima Lolli, 



Dum tu declamas Romee, Prseneste religi ; 



Qui, quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non, 



Plenius ac melius Chrysippo, et Crantore dicit." 



What Horace here says of Homer is true of Horace : 



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