Nay, Epicurus' race of life is run; That man of wit, who other men outshone, As far as meaner stars the mid-day sun. Mr. CREECH. The emperor appears as the rising sun, and holds a globe in his hand, to figure out the earth that is enlightened and actuated by his beauty. Sol qui terrarum flammis opera omnia lustras. -Ubi primos crastinus ortus Extulerit Titan, radiisque retexerit orbem. VIRG. Idem: Mr. DRYDEN. On his head you see the rays that seem to grow out of it. Claudian, in the description of his infant Titan, descants on this glory about his head, but has run his description into most wretched fustian. Invalidum dextro portat Titana lacerto, Nondum luce gravem, nec pubescentibus altè CLAUD. de rapt. Fros. lib. 2. An infant Titan held she in her arms; Yet sufferably bright, the eye might bear The ungrown glories of His beamy hair. Mild was the babe, and from his cries there came A gentle breathing and a harmless flame. The sun rises on a medal of Commodus,* as Ovid describes him in the story of Phaëton. Ardua prima via est, et quà vix manè recentes Enituntur equi Ov. Mot. lib. 2. You have here too the four horses breaking through the clouds in their morning passage. -Pyroëis, et Eöus, et Æthon, Salis equi, quartusque Phlegon Ibid. * Fig. 12. Corripuere viam, pedibusque per aëra motis -Ov. Met. lib. 2. The woman underneath represents the earth, as Ovid has drawn her sitting in the same figure. Sustulit omniferos callo tenus arida vultus ; The Earth at length Uplifted to the heav'ns her blasted head, And clapp'd her hand upon her brows, and said; Sunk deeper down, and sought a cooler seat.) Ibid. The cornu-copia in her hand is a type of her fruitfulness, as in the speech she makes to Jupiter. Hosne mihi fructus, hunc fertilitatis honorem, And does the plough for this my body tear? That herbs for cattle daily I renew, And food for man, and frankincense for you? Ibid. So much for the designing part of the medal; as for the thought of it, the antiquaries are divided upon it. For my part I cannot doubt but it was made as a compliment to Commodus on his skill in the chariot race. It is supposed that the same occasion furnished Lucan with the same thought in his address to Nero. Seu te flammigeros Phabi conscendere currus, Igne vago lustrare juvet.- Luc. lib. 1. ad Neronem. Or if thou chuse the empire of the day, Auspicious if thou drive the flaming team, Mr. Rowe. This is so natural an allusion, that we find the course of the sun described in the poets by metaphors borrowed from the Circus. Quum suspensus eat Phabus, currumque reflectat ·Hesperio positas in littore metas. Et sol ex æquo metâ distabat utrâque. MANIL. lib. 1. Ov. Met. lib. 2. Idem. However it be, we are sure in general it is a comparing of Commodus to the sun, which is a simile of as long standing as poetry, I had almost said, as the sun itself. I believe, says Cynthio, there is scarce a great man he ever shone upon that has not been compared to him. I look on similes as a part of his productions. I do not know whether he raises fruits or flowers in greater number. Horace has turned this comparison into ridicule seventeen hundred years ago. -Laudat Brutum, laudatque cohortem, Mr. CREECH. You have now shown us persons under the disguise of stars, moons, and suns. I suppose we have at last done with the celestial bodies. The next figure you see*, says Philander, had once a place in the heavens, if you will believe ecclesiastical story. It is the sign that is said to have appeared to Constantine before the battle with Maxentius. We are told by a Christian poet, that he caused it to be wrought on the military ensign that * Fig. 13. the Romans call their Labarum. And it is on this ensign that we find it in the present medal. Christus purpureum gemmanti textus in auro Prudent. contra Symm. lib. 1. A Christ was on th' imperial standard borne, That gold embroiders, and that gems adorn, By the word Christus he means, without doubt, the present figure, which is composed out of the two initial letters of the name. He bore the same sign in his standards, as you may see in the following medal and verses*. Agnoscas, regina, libens mea signa necesse est : Constantinus Romam alloquitur. Ibi My ensign let the queen of nations praise, Id. in Apotheosř. See there the cross he wav'd on hostile shores, But to return to our Labarum†; if you have a mind to see it in a state of paganism, you have it on a coin of Tiberius. It stands between two other ensigns, and is the mark of a Roman colony where the medal was stamped. By the way, you must observe, that wherever the Romans fixed their standards, they looked on that place as their country, and thought themselves obliged to defend it with their lives. For this reason their standards were always carried before them when they went to settle themselves in a colony. This gives the mean* *Fig. 14. † Fig. 15. ing of a couple of verses in Silius Italicus, that make a very far-fetched compliment to Fabius. Ocyus huc Aquilas servataque signa referte, Hic patria est, murique urbis stant pectore in uno. The following medal was stamped on Trajan's victory over the Daci*. You see on it the figure of Trajan presenting a little Victory to Rome. Between them lies the conquered province of Dacia. It may be worth while to observe the particularities in each figure. We see abundance of persons on old coins that hold a little Victory in one hand, like this of Trajan, which is always the sign of a conquest. I have sometimes fancied Virgil alludes to this custom in a verse that Turnus speaks. Non adeo has exosa manus victoria fugit. VIRG. En. lib. 11. Mr. DRYDEN. If you consent, he shall not be refus’d. Nor find a hand to victory unus❜d. The emperor's standing in a gown, and making a present of his Dacian victory to the city of Rome, agrees very well with Claudian's character of him. -Victura feretur Gloria Trajani; non tam quòd, Tigride victo, Quam patriæ quod mitis erat : CLAUD. de 4to. Cons. Honor, Thy glory, Trajan, shall for ever live: Not that thy arms the Tigris mourn'd, o'ercome, Not that the Capitol receiv'd thy train With shouts of triumph for the Daci slain: The city of Rome carries the wand in her hand that is the symbol of her divinity. *Fig. 16. |