s 
458 
republic so long the rival of Rome, were 
no doubt great and splendid events. 
The numerous examples of military virtue, 
patient perseverance, heroie courage, and 
hazardous enterprise, presented to the 
mmagination of Silius a series of brilliant 
achievements, peculiarly adapted to the 
epopea. A selection of the most pre- 
minent facts, connected with the defeat 
of Annibal, and the ultimate triumph of 
the Romans, \ with a judicious tnterpola- 
tion of those auxiliary graces of fiction 
and machmery which the laws of the 
epic admit, might have formed an inter- 
esting and pleasing poem. But Silius 
has adhered too servilely to the order of 
historical narrative. Whatever is to be 
found in the prose of Livy, of sieges, bat- 
tles and marches, may be seen recorded 
in the measured verse of Silius. The ob- 
jection that we have already to the Phar- 
salia, applies almost in the same depree 
to the poem now under consideration. 
The action was not suthciently remote 
from the age in which Silius wrote, to 
admit of that grandeur of machinery. 
which a subject of a more fabulous 
nature, or of greater antiquity, would have 
been susceptible As weil might a mo- 
dern select the naval exploits of a Nelson, 
er the campaigns of Napcleon, as fit ob- 
jects for the Epic Muse. Every circum- 
stance of the Punic wars being familiar to 
the Romans from the full and authentic 
relations of Polybius and Livy, restrained 
the poet from those necessary fictions, 
and cues descriptions, which give life 
to the Iliad and A‘neid. If indeed the 
idea of a mere historical poem could be 
maintained distinct from the epopera, 
that of Silius might not be without its 
merit and use. There is undoubtedly 
this difference between the histerian and 
the poet, that the narration of Livy 
forms a solid and compact body, con- 
nected in all its parts, and complete in 
itself, while in Sillus we see so many 
disjecta membre regularly deduced, but 
relating to the same facts, and celebs ra- 
ting fiche characters, so that to re- 
peat an observation of the learned Er- 
nesti, were the writings of Polybius, Ap- 
pian, and Livy, to be by any possible ac- 
cident lost, we might still have recourse 
for historical information to the poem of 
Ttalicus. 
Let us now see what degree of poetical 
ornament Silius has ee into Ins sub- 
ject and style. In his management of 
both, he has implicitly followed those 
rules of the epopeea, which were consi- 
dered as laws in his time, and sanctioned 
mo 
same 
Lyceum of Ancient senate ae Ttaheus. 
a 
[Dec. i 
by the numerous examples in Homer, and 
in Virgil. As it is the poe property 
of heroic verse to embellish with the 
charms of poetry those events most likely 
to excite admiration, and animate the 
mind to generous sentiments, he has oc- 
casionally endeavoured to vary the uni- 
formity of his narrative. For instance, 
Annibal, having taken Saguutum, resolves 
to pass ‘the Alps and march to Rome. 
Silus, in imitation of the manner of 
Homer, of invoking the assistance of the 
gods in all diticult emergencies, imagines 
that Jupiter sends Mercury to appear be- 
fore Annibal, and excite him to pursue 
his march to Rome. _ Venus complains 
of the success of the Carthaginian hero, 
but is consoled in hearing of the future 
grandeur of the Romans, (lib. 3.) In an- 
other part of the poem where Annibal is 
mentioned as on his march, the poet, in 
close imitation of Homer, minutely de- 
scribes the different nations of which his 
army is composed. In the eighth book 
he enumerates in a similar manner, the 
forces of the Romans. In the thirteenth 
book, Scipio visits the infernal regions 
like Ulysses in the Odyssey, and Atneas 
in the Aineid. Other specimens of his 
machinery are to be found in different 
parts of the poem; but it must be ob- 
served, that they are all professed imita- 
tions of former poets, and give Silius not 
‘the smallest clann to or iginality, or merit 
of invention. 
Tt will be easy to fonts a judgment of 
the style of Silius, by recurring to what 
we have already said concerning the ge- 
neral character of the poem. With a 
view to its decoration, he collected what- 
ever the art of Greece or Rome had 
adopted for the embellishment of an 
Epic; uniformity of style, therefore, was 
not to be expected. Tis peculiar cha- 
racteristic is variety, contrary to that 
equable and steady current which we ad- 
mire in Virgil. This variety arises prin- 
cipaliy from his frequent imitations of 
other authors. Virgil was content with 
borrowing from the Greeks, but Silius 
appears to have adopted without scruple 
the sentiments and manner of both Greek 
and Roman writers. To form a correct 
opinion of his merit, we must not criticise 
his poem as a hole but select those 
parts most conspicuous for beauty or 
elegance.. In the narrative part, which 
is indeed seldom interrupted by episodes, 
he in general maintains the gravity and 
dignity suited to the epic ; and consider- 
ing the frequent helps of which he fr eely 
availed himself, he has preserved a per- 
spicuity 
