give his own choice words: 'In the Second Punic War, with winged step the Muse bore herself to the warlike, rugged race of Romulus.' On the other hand, it is commonly received that Livius Andronicus wrote his dramas before Naevius, who gave his to the public in the year 519 (A. U. C.).

Now that the poets are enumerated and classified, certain questions may receive attention. Why does Horace question whether or not comedy is poetry? Forsooth, because it is humble, must it be denied the title of poetry? Surely an unfortunate ruling! So far from comedy not being poetry, I would almost consider it the first and truest of all poetry, for comedy employs every kind of invention, and seeks for all kinds of material.

Another question: Was Lucan a poet? Surely he was. As usual, the grammarians deny this, and object that he wrote history. Well now! produce a pure history. Lucan must differ from Livy, and the difference is verse. Verse is the property of the poet. Then who will deny that all epic poets go to history for their subjects? History, sometimes delineated only in semblance, sometimes idealized, and always with changed aspect, is made the basis of poetry. Is not this the practice of Homer? Do we not do this in the tragedies themselves? Such is the practice of Lucan. Instance the image of the country offering itself to Caesar, the spirit called forth from Hades, and other such episodes. Wherefore, indeed, it seems to me that it would be better to give the title of poet to Livy than to deny it to Lucan. For as the tragic poets base their plays upon true events, but adapt the actions and speeches to the characters, so Livy and Thucydides insert orations which were never recognized by those to whom they were attributed. Moreover, although Aristotle exercised this censure so severely that he would refuse the name of poet to versifiers, yet in practice he speaks differently, and says: 'As Empedocles poetically wrote (Tоínσev); so he even calls Empedocles, who feigned not at all, a poet.

Some writers, among whom is Plutarch, make a distinction between poesis and poema, calling the former a legitimate work, and the latter an insignificant one, and citing the Iliad as poesis, and the Margites as poema. Surely this is mischievous. For poema is the very work itself, the material, I might say, which is used in the making. Poesis, on the other hand, is the plan and form of the poem. From the three persons of a verb we get the three words, poema, poesis, and poeta: thus poema: TeToínμai (I have made myself, or I have been made); poesis: TETоíησαι (you, etc.); poeta: Teñoíŋτai (he, etc.). You find an exact analogy in cupηua (an invention), evpeσis (a discovery), and Euperýs (an inventor). So poema may be applied to the Iliad, poeta, to Homer, and poesis to the form and plan of the Margites.

The poetical art is a science, that is, it is a habit of production in accordance with those laws which underlie that symmetrical fashioning known as poetry. So it has three elements the material, the form, and the execution. In the higher criticism, a fourth element is recognized, the end, that is imitation, or the ulterior end, instruction-for if Cicero uses the word guidance (rectio), may I not be allowed the same privilege?

Poems differ in the objects of imitation, the means, and the manner. Ovid imitates the same Medea in the Metamorphoses that Seneca does in his tragedy, but the verses whereby they are imitated are different, and since one is a dramatic presentation, and the other receives an epic setting, the mode or manner is different. The Aeneid and the Eclogues use the same medium, but differ in the objects of imitation and the manner. The Eclogues and comedies, again, agree in the manner of imitation, but differ in objects and media.

I. 3.

CLASSIFICATION OF THE KINDS OF POETRY

Now, to take up the modes of poetry, we find that one is simple 'narration, as in the poems of Lucretius. The Greeks call this mode διηγηματικός, ἐξηγηματικός, οι άπоdinуnμaтikós (descriptive, narrative). A second mode is conversation, such as is employed in comedies. The original Greek term for this was duaλoynτiós (conversational), and the word was most accurately employed, for it was usage that yielded the derived meaning of disputation. In fact, diáλEKTOS has no other meaning than conversation. As said above, we learn through the transmission of ideas from one mind to another, and the prefix dá signifies transmission, as in διαπρό (right through) and in διαμπερές (through and through). In line with this, those loose discourses which reproduce the conversation of a group of men-not of two only, as the grammarians falsely assert-were called dialogues. Alexamenes, the Teian, is regarded as the inventor of the dialogue, just as Aristotle said, and he ennobled it with illustrious themes and divine utterance. Lucian, in turn, degraded it to mimes and lascivious jesting. And just as in the process of development this loose style of speaking was adapted to metre, and used in plots, so Crates the Athenian in turn was the first to throw off these chains, and to produce dramas without metre.

This second mode, the Saλoynτikós, was also called dramatic (Spaμaτikós), from its gestures and acting; 'dramatic' being from the Greek verb Spâv, meaning 'to do.' Nor is this etymology contradicted by the fact that some parts in a drama are delivered by actors who are seated, for the epithet 'dramatic' was determined by the predominating characteristic, and then too, there is some action even when

an actor is seated. Since the actor, who is an imitator, is said 'to do,' some were not afraid to call this mode imitative, though the same men would have recognized imitation as the end of poetry in general.

There is also a mixed mode, in which the poet employs both narration and conversation. The Greeks happily termed this μktós (mixed, compound), and less accurately, KOLÓS (common), for a compound is made up of parts, but no one would say that the compound is common to the parts; the parts themselves constitute the whole. It is clearly quite another case when we say that a genus is common to its species. The genus is indeed a part of its species, comprehending them by predication, not by inclusion. So we have adopted the term modes, not the term species, because modes both join together and compound, while species do not.

Of dramatic poetry there are many subdivisions, and we shall at once treat them in their proper chapters. The earliest form is the pastoral, the latest is comedy and its offspring, tragedy. The epic is a mixed form, and because it is catholic in the range of subject-matter, is the chiefest of all forms.

Now in our treatment of poetry we can follow either the order of excellence or the chronological order. The most excellent kinds of poetry are hymns and paeans; next rank songs (mele), odes, and scolia, which are sung in the praise of brave men. The epic, in which are both heroes and lesser men, comes third, and then follows tragedy along with comedy. Comedy, however, will receive a fourth place by itself. Thereafter come satires, exodia, interludes, jests, nuptial songs, elegies, monodies, incantations, and epigrams. If we follow the chronological order, we shall find that the earliest form is likewise the mildest, the most naive, and the most inept. But it is best to make this our startingpoint, and to follow the suggestion of nature, which derives the more complex forms from the simpler.

I. 4.

PASTORAL POETRY

The earliest kind of poetry was of course the product of one of the earliest stages of life, either the pastoral stage, the hunting, or the agricultural. Now because the hunter is intent upon his work, he is little inclined to words; we do not think it good luck to speak while hunting, much less would singing be in place. But the shepherd and the husbandman practised the art of song. As Varro states, and Thucydides implies, the pastoral stage preceded the agricultural; and the fact that the farmer lives a life of toil, but the shepherd of leisure, is additional evidence. Moreover, rhythmical utterance seems to have been learned in the field, either through an impulse caught from nature, or through imitation of the songs of the little birds, or of the sighing, of the trees. Leisure is indeed the parent of luxury and

wantonness.

This leisurely life, then, produced two species of alluring song: the one, when, retired with a maiden beneath the summer shade, the lover would sing his amours to satietythe so-called poetic monologue (monoprosopos); the other, when either by accident or design those would meet between whom love or hate had been aroused, or who were emulous of one another, or jealous because of a song, a flock, or a maiden.

Of this last kind there were two sub-species. In the one, the verses were without fixed metre or rule, and because this poetry was vulgar, lawless, and rude, and, in distinction. from the later style, purely a product of nature and not at all of art, it had no name. In the other, the emulous sentiments were clothed in verses of similar structure, and regular in metre. From its nature, this variety was called

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