But ravish not, depending on thy might, 440 Thele precepts be thy guide thro' life to teer: Next learn the gods immortal to revere : With unpolluted hands, and heart fincere, Let from your herd, or flock, an off'ring rise; Of the pure vidim burn the white fat thighs; And to your wealth confine the facrifice. Let the rich fumes of od’rous incense Ay, A grateful favour, to the pow'rs on high; The due libation nor neglect to pay, When ev'ning closes, or when dawns the day : Then fhall thy work, the gods thy friends, fucceed; Then may you purchase farms, nor fell through need. Enjoy thy riches with a lib'ral foul, Plenteous the feast, and smiling be the bowl; No friend forget, nor entertain thy foe, Nor let thy neighbour uninvited go. Happy the man with peace his days are crown'd,460 Whole house an honest neighbourhood furround; Of foreign harms he never fleeps afraid, They, always ready, bring their willing aid; Cheerful, fhould he fome bufy preffure feel, They lend an aid beyond a kindred's zeal; They never will conspire to blast his fame : Secure he walks, unfully'd his good name : Unhappy man, whom neighbours ill furround, His oxen die oft' by a treach'rous wound, Whate'er you borrow of your neighbour's store, Return the fame in weight, if able, more; 471 So to yourself will you fecure a friend; To all a love for love return: contend From little oft' repeated, much will rife, The juft reward of our induftrious hands, When at your board your faithful friend you greet, Without referve, and lib'ral be the treat: 508 Let not a woman fteal your heart away, By tender looks, and her apparel gay; When your abode the languishing inquires, Command your heart, and quench the kindling fires; 510 If love the vows, 'tis madness to believe, If large poffeflions are in life thy view, NOTES ON THE FIRST BOOK OF THE WORKS AND DAYS. Ver. I. ARISTARCHUS, and fome others, are for having this exordium left out, as not a part of the poem. Praxiphanes, a scholar of Theophraftus, fays, he had a copy which begun from this verse. As here on earth we tread the maze of life. The reafon which Proclus aligns for it not being writ by Hefiod, is, that he who begun his Theogony, with an invocation to the mufes from Helicon, and who was himself brought up at the foot of that mountain, would never call on the Pierian mufes. A weak objection, and unworthy a critic! the diftinction is as follows. The mufes are faid to be the daughters of Jove, that is, of that power by which we are enabled to perform. Pieria is faid to be the birth-place of the mufes, and the feat of Jove, that is, the mind, whence all our conceptions arife. Helicon is a place of refidence to the mufes, where they celebrate the praises of their father, and fearch into the knowledge of antiquity. In this work Hefiod inftructs his brother in the art of tillage and morality, all which doctrines proceed from his own experience, his own natural fentiments, and therefore he invokes the mufes from Pieria; his account of the Generation of the Gods, being received, partly from books, and partly from oral tradition, he invokes them from Helicon. Tzetz. Here the Scholaft talks as if he did not doubt thefe lines being genuine. Ver. 13. This exordium was certainly admired by Horace, who, in one of his odes, has elegantly tranflated this part of it. Valet ima fummis Mutare, et infignem attenuat, deus, I must acknowledge, after all, what Paufanias says, Ver. 23. The words of Hefiod are thefe; "there "is not one kind of contention only on earth, but "there are two, which divide the mind." In the Theogony he makes but one contention, and that fprung from night, foon after the birth of the fates, and other evil deities, which are of the fame parent. From contention fprung all that is hurtful to gods and men, as plagues, wars, fecret bloodfhed, flander, &c. The fecond contention, emulation, which was planted in the womb of earth by Jove, must be after the invention of arts; for before was no room for emulation. The contention first mentioned, was before the wars of the giants. Of that fee farther in the notes to the Theogony. Ver. 29. The truth of this will plainly appear, when we confider the neceffity of many of our actions, which, though involuntary, are rendered neceffary by the cause. By involuntary I do not mean without the confent of the will, because it is certain that must precede the action, but what we had rather we had no occafion to do. Ver. 43. Hear Plato on this paffage; his words are thefe: "And fo it is neceffary," fays Hefiod, or according to Hefiod, "it fhould be among all of the fame profeflion, that they may be filled with envy, and contention." Plato certainly miftakes the poet in this, when he imagines that Hefiod thinks it abfolutely neceffary for the better government of the world. All that he means is, he finds it fo in nature; and, from our appetites natural to us, we cannot avoid it. The rest of the note by Mr. Theobald. Ariftotle in his fecond book of Rhetoric, in the chapter on envy, quotes this paffage of Hefiod, though he does not name the author, with this introduction," because men man. This cuftom of dividing the father's patrimony by lot among all the children, is likewife alluded to in the Odyffes of Homer, Book 14. Ver. 59. What a noble triumph is this over the avarice and injuftice of his brother, and the partiality of the judges! How much like a philofopher is this greatnefs of foul, in his contempt of ill got riches! What a conqueft has he gained, though he loft the caufe, and fuffered by the wickedness of his adverfary! He not only fhows himself a happy man, but teaches him by whom he is most injured to be fo too. I have taken the liberty to add this line, which is not in the original, as an explanation of this famous paffage of our poet, which, and no other, I am certain must be his meaning: How blefs'd the frugal, and an honest board. The μάλαχ and ασφόδελος, the frt of which we generally render in English the mallows, and the latter the daffodil, the names of which I have not tranflated, being of no confequence to the beauty of this paffage. Plutarch, in his Banqnet of the Seven Wife Men, commends as the wholefomest of herbs; he mentions the avetpixos, which Le Clerc tells us is a part of the ardidos: the fame critic alfo obferves, from Scaliger, that it appears from this verfe that the ancients did eat the daffodil, or ασφόδελος. Ver. 67. What the poct means by this, and the preceding lines, is, if we knew how few things are neceffary for the fupport of life, we fhould not be fo folicitous about it as we are; we should not spend fo much time in agriculture and navigation as we do. This expreflion of laying the rudder over the fmoke, alludes to the custom of laying it to harden over the fmoke at thofe times in which they did not use it. Says Grævius on this verfe, it was cuftomary to hang the rudders in the fmoke, when the feafon for failing was paffed; by which they believed they were preferved from rotting, and kept folid till the next feason. This we find likewife among the precepts in the fecond book of this poem. And o'er the smoke the well made rudder lay. Ver. 327. Which rule alfo Virgil has laid down in his Georgic, in his direction for tools of husbandry: Et fufpenfa focis exploret robora fumus. Lib. I. Ver. 69. Hear the Scholiaft on this paffage, on the invention of arts; men, fays he, were at first fimple and unexperienced; the art of agriculture, and all other, were entirely unknown; they knew not difeafes, nor the pangs of death; when they died they expired on the ground, as if they knew "of Hefiod, which does not appear from guous not what they fuffered. They enjoyed the fruit χρυσενς. This obfervation will be good in of the earth in common among them. Then were greater points How far 1 may be indulged no rulers: for all were lords of themselves: but in the liberty I have taken with this paffage I when men grew gunéssign, which is the fignifi-know not; but I am fure this part of her drefs cation of Prometheus, more cunning, more apt to contrive, they departed from their primitive temperance, and confequently their ferenity. Then the ufe of fire was difcovered, which was the fource of all mechanical arts. Tzetz. Ver. 71. It is beyond difpute, that with the invention and improvement of arts, the luxury of men increased, and that difeafes were the effects of luxury. And the ftol'n fire back to the fkies he bore. This paiTage of the fable, most of the commentators have left untouched, as not knowing what to make of it. I think it must allude to the decay of arts and sciences; which the fucceeding verle will farther explain. Ver. 73. By Prometheus is furely meant, as before, pure, wifer men, who were as forward to recover or revive loft arts, as to invent new. "This Ver. 76. The original is sy xash; which expreffion is ufed again in the Theogony, verle 567 of the original, and 847 of my tranflation: there is a curious comment on this paflage in Tournefort's account of the inland of Skinofa, in his voyage into the Levant; which I shall here give as near a tranflation of as I can "iland abounds with the ferula of the ancients; "the old name of which is preferved by the mo"dern Grecks, who call it Nartheca, from Nag: "it has a stalk five feet in height, and three inch"es thick: every ten inches it has a knot that is "branchy, and covered with a hard bark: the "hollow of the stalk is full of white marrow, which, when dry, takes fire like a match; which fire continues a long while, and confumes the "marrow by flow degrees, without doing any damage to the bark; for which reafon this plant "is uied for carrying fire from one place to another: our failors laid in a large ftore of it: this *ufe of it is derived from early antiquity; and * may contribute to the explanation of a paffage in Heuod, who, fpeaking of the fire which Pro"metheus ftole from heaven, fays, that he brought *it in agênxi, i. e. in Latin ferula; this fable doubtlefs arifes from Prometheus difcovering the "ule of steel in ftriking fire from the flint: and "Prometheus moft probably made ufe of the mar "row of the ferula, and inftructed men how to preferve fire in the stalk of this plant. Ver. 112. "The original is equus queious iras xe. They placed about her body ornaments of gold. A ftrict regard ought always to "be paid to the original meaning of the ancient "author; if a liberty is took by the tranflator, "for the better embellishing the poem, it is proper to have a remark on that occafion. The danger arising from fuch an omiflion, is, that the reader who depends on the tranflation may "be misled in facts; as from this paffage he would * take it for granted, diamonds were in the days TRAN contributes more towards the beauty of the whole, than a golden necklace, which Valla has given her in his following translation: Aurea candenti pofuere monilia collo. Ver. 121. To pafs over the poetical beauty of this allegory, let us come to the explication of it. To punish the crime of Prometheus, Jupiter fends a woman on earth. How agreeable in the whole is the ftory conducted! Vulcan firft moulds her to form; that is after the ufe of fire was found out, of which Vulcan is called the god, by art men begun to embellifh the works of nature: then all the inferior arts, which are meant by the other deities, confpire to render the beauties of nature Alll more charming. By thefe means the defires of men grew thronger and impetuous, and plunged them on to fuch excelfive indulgence of their fenfes, as brought on them the miferies which the poet afterwards mentions. Ver. 125. How admirable is the fable continued! Here is a virgin made of all the charms of art and nature, to captivate the eyes, and endowed with all the cunning of the fex to gain on the heart, for that is the meaning of her being fent by Herines. Thus formed, av deig, "having received a tribute from all the gods" to complete her, well that no art can withstand." Here Prometheus, that may the poet call her δύλον αμήχανον, “a temptation is the wife man, who forfees the event of things, warns his brother Epimetheus, that is, the man who is wife too late, to avoid the fight of fuch an affemblage of graces. Of läpetus, Prometheus, &c. and the deities here mentioned, fee farther in the Theogony. Ver. 140. Pandora's box may properly be took in the fame myitical fenfe, with the apple in the book of Genefis; and in that light the moral will appear without any difficulty. Ver. 146. With what a forrowful folemnity thefe lines run, aufwerable to the lenfe contained in them: Αλλά δε μυρια λυγρα κατ' ανθρωπος αλαλήθαι, Αλεή μεν γαρ γαια κακων, πλείη δε θάλασσα. Some think the ftory of Pandora, and the account we have from Mofes of the fall of man, were took from the fame tradition. The curfe, indeed, pronounced against Adam, in the third chapter of Genefis, is the fame with this in the effect; but what weight this imagination may carry with it, I fhail not undertake to determine This story is imitated, and in feveral lines tranflated by Quillet, in his Callipedia, and by the late Dr. Parnell, in his poem, called, The Rife of Women. Ver. 160. It is certain, from this paffage, that, according to the fyftem of our author in this po em, the golden age preceded the creation of woman, the being fent by Jupiter, who had then the B government of heaven. And agreeable to this, is the defcription of the felicity of human ftate, before Epimetheus had knowledge of Pandora We muft obferve, that this does not coincide with his account in the Theogony, where, after Saturn's revenge on his father, the Furies, Contention, and all the confequences of it, immediately appear Ver. 173. The notion of guardian angels has prevailed among many in almost all ages, and all countries. Paffages of the like nature are frequent in both the Old and New Testament, and in Ho. mer allo; and, as Mr. Additon obferves, Milton doubtless had an eye on this part of Hefiod, where he fays, Millions of fpiritual creatures walk the earth Unfeen, both when we wake and when we fleep. Paradife Loft. I cannot help taking particular notice of the beauty and ufe of our author's doctrine of guardi an angels; he makes them warn Qoijwviss Sπ' alav, "wandering all over the earth;" Quλacovo, ridines, nai xerxia igya, "they keep an account of actions, both just and unjuft." Thefe fentiments grafted in the minds of the people, and received as a point of faith by them, would make them always on their guard; and there being λjodoje," the difpofers of riches," would be fufficient to induce them to good actions. The making them the inftruments of Providence, to reward men according to their me rits to each other in his life, is a doctrine so ami. able, that if the truth of it cannot be proved, it ought never to be publicly argued againft. Here the poet endeavours to deter his brother from any future injuftice, by telling him all his actions are recorded; and that according to their merits, he fhall be rewarded. Ver. 185. Men of the former age were made of the earth, and the first elements, therefore more frong of body than thefe of a mixed feed. The word on, here made use of for nature, is a metaphor taken from trees and plants. The verb is Cy, to plant, &c. Tzetz. Not much unlike this is the account we have from Mofes of the different generations of man in carlier times. Ver. 206. All the commentators which I ever faw, feem to have entirely mistook the fenfe of this line, nor have Valla and Frifius entered into the meaning of the poet in their tranflations: the firit tranflates ex prízy Sanguine- Dryadumque creata fprung from the blood of the dryads, or wood. nymphs: and Frifius has it "quercubus ex duris," from hard oaks. I fhall ufe the comment which Mr. Theobald has furnished me with on this occaflor, and in the fame words in which he gave it to me. I think I may venture to affirm, from the comments they have given it, that none of all the Greek commentators rightly understood this paffage. I believe I may fay the fame of the Latin critics: Grævius, Le Clerc, and Hier fius, have paffed the difficulty over in filence. Screvelius falls into the interpretation of the Greek scholiasts; and Guietus. it is plain, faw nothing of what I apprehended to be the meaning of the poet; becaufe he makes an alteration of the text itself, | changing se μsdev into se os peidis, abfonum inordinatum: this, too, he borrows from one of the conjectures of Tzetzes; who first together with Mofcopylus and Pr clus, tells us, that by expedia (for they all make but one word of it), the poet intends to inform us, that this race was made out of afhen-trees; that is to fay, of a firm and unperishable make but was the fame generation brazen and wooden too? It might much more reasonably been called the wooden age, if Jupiter had formed the people out of trees. Hefid, I am perfuaded, had no thought of obtruding fuch a generation on us: befides, as neither in the defcription of the golden or filver age, the poet has given us any account of what materials the men were formed, why should he do it here? In short, let us rectify the pointing of the whole paffage, and take the context along with us, and a very little fagacity, I hope, will rettore us the author's true meaning. I have a great fulpicion the verfes ought to be point ed thus: Καλκείον ποιησ', εκ αργύξω will be "potent day is the DoΜελια is not on 5ο εκ μελίαν δεινον τε και ομβριμον, Τωδ' αμ αβαντες ετοντο θιοι οπιθεν κομοωντές, Down their broad fhoulders falls a length of hair, The Scholiaft on the place, explains une by the word δόρασιν απο ωιλίας ξυλο γενομένοις. " fpears made out of the ash tree fo in our poet, ix μsλιαν δεινον I take to be no more than δια των μελι wy, or rais pediziç devov, "terrible with spears." Both the prepofitions are indifferently ufed, in the fame Ζευς δε πατης τρίον αλλο γένος μερόπων ανθρω- manner, by the beft profe writers, as well as the the brazen age, likewise distinguishes it by this propensity to arms. Tertia poft illas fucceffit aënea proles, Savior ingeniis, et ad horrida promptior arma. Ver. 208. Here the poet, speaking of the giant race, fays, vòi ri oro, of which Schrevelius, Tzetzes, and other commentators, fay they feed not on bread, or meat dreffed, but tore and eat the limbs of beafts. Ver. 210. That there was a time when brazen arms were used, we may learn from Plutarch; who tells us, when Cimon, the fon of Miltiades, carried the bones of Phefeus from the ifle of Scyros to Athens, he found interred with him a fword, and the head of a fpear, made of brass. Paufanias, who mentions this fact, tells us, that iron was then begun to be used in war; but for brazen arms in heroical times, he gives the instances of Pylander's ax, and the dart of Meriones, both from Homer. He likewife alleges the authority of the spear of Achilles, preferved in the temple of Minerva at Phafelis, and the fword of Memnon, all of brafs, in the temple of Æfculapius in Nicomedia. Lucretius is a voucher, almott in the words of our author, for the antiquity and ufe of brass before that of iron. Pofteriùs ferri vis eft ærifque reperta, Sed priùs æris erat, quam ferri, cognitus ufus. The remarks from Paufanias and Lucretius, are by Mr. Theobald. See farther in the obfervation on line 2534 of the Theogony. Ver. 218. Exactly the fame is the diflinction Mofes makes in Genefis: fays he, "There were giants in the earth in those days;" and alfo after that," when the fons of God came unto the daugh ters of men, and they bare children to them, "the fame became mighty men, which were of "old, men of renown. Chap. vi. ver. 4 Here are plainly the age of giants, and the age of heroes. obferve that Homer, in his account of Elyfium, judged very wrong, when he made Achilles fay to Ulyffes," he would rather ferve the pooreft on "earth, than rule over the departed" Od. B. II. Speaking thus dreadfully of a future state, and of the happieft condition of it, is no encouragement to the living. Ver. 231. The original of this is omitted in many editions, but Grævius is for restoring it from a manufcript which he had feen. Ver. 234. Here he cannot mention the vices of his age without showing the utmost deteftation to them. We fee the fame purity of manners, the fame air of piety, running through all his works. See the Life. Ver. 246. This paffage Ovid has beautifully tranflated in his Metamorphofes; and indeed feve ral parts of Hefiod are well improved by that fine poet. In the divifion of the ages he differs from our author, and of five makes but four. "It is the opinion of fome, that it would have been "better, if Ovid had paid as great regard to the "historical relations, as to the beauties of those "whom he imitates." Ver. 268 Here the poet likens himself to the nightingale, and the judges to the birds of prey. Tzetz. This transition, from the five ages to the fable of the hawk and the nightingale, is a little abrupt. The remaining part of this book contains a beautiful, though fmall body of moral philofophy. Ver. 316 By this antithefis how lively is the ftate of the righteous reprefented This it is gives fuch a beauty to the firft and thirty-feventh Pfalms, where the natural ftate of the juft and unjust is truly defcribed, and in many circumftances like this of our po t Ver. 325. Examples of this may be found in hiftory. When a vengeance of this kind happens, the execution of it depends on the degree of the perfon guilty, and the nature of the crime committed, and against whom, as that of Faris, who was the fon of a powerful prince; and who, in breaking the Ver 230. The fortunate islands, by the Greeks laws of hofpitality, offended a powerful people, by Bought to be the feats of good men. Homer, Ly-which he involved his country in ruin. ceperen. Plutarch, Philoftratus, and Dion, as well Hefiod, have mentioned, and unanimoufly agree, that they are fragrant fruitful fields, and meadows, as lovely to the eye as the mind of man can imagine. Tzetz. Agreeable to this, is that beautiful defcription of Elyfium in the eis of Virgil. Ver. 326. He now turns the difcourfe from his brother to the judges, by whom likewife he had been injured He exhorts them to the purfuit of juftice, on thefe two confiderations: firft, Because ths wicked man, who plots the deftruction of ano her, at the fame time works his own unhappi nels; and, fecondly, Becaufe the gods are not only confcious of all our actions, but our very thoughts. Ver. 330. This re; etition of the circumfpection of the guardian angels, and the punishment of the unrighteous, is to keep the crime of which they were guilty fresh in the memory of his brother and the judges Repetitions of this nature are frequent in the Greek poets, and more particularly in Homer than any other, Ver. 341 The original has it, that Justice reminds Jove of human wickednefs, and folicits him that the people may be punished for the offences of their rulers. |