1808.] 
“to sacrifice many much more inno- 
cent victims to his ambition or safety, to 
spare the unfortunate possessor of so 
dangerous a secret, Itis not to be cre-+ 
dited that he would have contented him- 
self with a simple banishment, which 
restrained neither the tongue, nor the 
pen, of an exasperated poet, 
The exile of Ovid has also been attri- 
buted to his discovery of an intrigue be- 
tween Julia and Mecenas. Others have 
persuaded themselves, that he himself 
was beloved by that wanton princess, 
whom he is supposed to have alluded to, 
and celebrated, under the name of Co- 
rinna; and the authority of Sidonius 
Apollinaris is adduced in confirmation of 
thisopinion, But it will be found equally 
untenable with the tormer, when we 
consider, that by his own statement 
(Trist. lib. 4 el. 11.) Ovid was very 
young, when his name and that of his 
mistress were rendered so famous in 
tome, by his verses; and he was more 
than tifty, when he incurred the sentence 
of banishment. It has been again sur- 
mised, that this aspiring poet, not satis- 
fied with so inany easy conquests,. had 
formed the ambitious hope of pleasing 
even the imperial Livia, the chaste wife 
of Augustus; and that ‘the emperor, sa- 
tisfied that nothing cruninal had oc- 
curred, but justly displeased with his 
presumption, dismissed him, to repent 
his temerity, at leisure, among. the wilds 
ot Pontus. For this singular opinion, which 
is, however, maintained by Mr. Poinsinet 
de Sivey, with some plausibility of rea- 
some, there is no other foundation, than 
the follwing lines: 
Cur aliquid vidi ? Cur conscia lumina feci ? 
Cur imprudenti cognita culpa mihi? 
Inscius Actieon vidit sine veste Dianam 3; 
Prada fuit canibus non minus ille suis. 
From this it is inferred, that Ovid 
-had indiscreetly surveyed id charms of 
- the empress, while in her bath, and, like 
Acton, was punished for his curiosity. 
But it is more probable, that the allusion 
to that fabulous tradition was a inere 
figure of speech, and introduced as re- 
sembling his own peculiar fate, Prom 
the two first lines, indeed, Cur uliguid 
vidi? &¢C. we may form, perhaps the 
only probable conjecture that can be ad- 
duced, in the absence of any direct au- 
thority; that Ovid had been the acci- 
dental and unwilling witness of some act 
of infamy, or peculiar obscenity, com- 
mitted either by Augustus, or some 
branch of the imperial family. Of this 
Lyceum of Ancient Literature—Ovid. 
419 
opinion appears to be Ciofanius, one of 
the learned authors of his life. And 
here must necessarily end every enquiry 
into this mysterious affair; which is ob- 
secured, rather than elucidated, by the 
imperfect hints of Ovid himself, and ig 
not mentioned by any contemporary 
writer, 
Whatever was the crime, it was expi- 
ated by a rigorous exile which ended only 
with his life. The place of his relegation 
was ‘Lomi, in the inate of Pontus, on 
the borders of the Euxine sea. ‘This 
might be a residence sufficiently agree- 
able to its own inhabitants; but the 
mountains to the south, which intercepted 
the genial warmth of the sun, the cold 
winds which blew from the Euxine on 
the northern and eastern sides, the thick- 
ness of the forests, and the damps arising 
from the neighbouring Danube, rendered 
it insupportable to a man accustomed to 
the luxurious climate of Italy. The mild- 
ness of his temper, and the elegance of 
his manners, so far conciliated the rude 
natives of the place, that they endea- 
voured to lessen his affliction, by every 
attention in their power. In return, he 
acquired their language and condescend- 
ed to compose soine little poems in their 
barbarous Getic idiom. But the cha- 
racter of Ovid would have recommended 
itself snore to our esteem, had he pos- 
sessed philosophy enough to submit to a 
destiny which had become irreparable, 
and to forbear that style of languor, which 
in some degree disgraces his later poems. 
He. endeavoured by the most pathetic 
epistles, addressed to his friends and 
sometimes to Augustus himself, to excite 
the pity, and merit the clemency, of his 
master, But the emperor continued in- 
exorable, and the unmanly complaints of 
the exiled poet were disregarded. Nor 
did the death of Augustus, which hap- 
pened in the fourth year of his exile, pro- 
duce any favourable alteration in bis 
fortunes. That he was equally unsuc- 
cesstui in Ins addresses to ‘Tiberius, may 
be considered an additional proof, that 
the fate of Ovid was connected with some 
mysterious transaction in the imperial 
family. A general accusation of immo- 
rality would probably have had little 
weight with Tiberius, a monster of de- 
pravity, and familiar with crimes, of 
which Ovid was never suspected, Ile 
lingered three years more, and then -ex- 
pired in bis 58th year, lamented hy fie 
inhabitants of Yomi,, who buried le 
with great funeral pomp, near the gate 
of thear city, after having considered ae: L; 
during 
