But this I know, and this I feel,
As onward to the tomb I steal,
That still as death approaches nearer,
The joys of life are sweeter, dearer;
And had I but an hour to live,

That little hour to bliss I'd give.

he has selected is a specimen of a carelessness not very commendable. At the same time I confess, that none of the Latin poets have ever appeared to me so capable of imitating the graces of Anacreon as Catullus, if he had not allowed a depraved imagination to hurry him so often into mere vulgar licentiousness.

That still as death approaches nearer,

The joys of life are sweeter, dearer;] Pontanus has a very delicate thought upon the subject of old age:

Quid rides, Matrona ? senem quid temnis amantem?
Quisquis amat nullâ est conditione senex.

Why do you scorn my want of youth,

And with a smile my brow behold?

Lady dear! believe this truth,
That he who loves cannot be old.

ODE VIII.

I CARE not for the idle state
Of Persia's king, the rich the great:
I envy not the monarch's throne,
Nor wish the treasur'd gold my own.
But oh! be mine the rosy wreath,

Its freshness o'er my brow to breathe;

"The German poet Lessing has imitated this ode. Vol. i. p. 24." Degen. Gail de Editionibus.

Baxter conjectures that this was written upon the occasion of our poet's returning the money to Polycrates, according to the anecdote in Stobæus.

I care not for the idle state

Of Persia's king, &c.]

"There is a fragment of Archilochus in Plutarch, De tranquillitate animi,' which our poet has very closely imitated here; it begins,

Ου μοι τα Γύγεω του πολυχρυσου μελει.”

BARNES.

In one of the monkish imitators of Anacreon we find the same

thought:
:-

Ψυχην εμην ερωτω,

Τι σοι θελεις γενεσθαι ;

Θελεις Γύγεω τα και τα;

Be mine the rich perfumes that flow,
To cool and scent my locks of snow.
To-day I'll haste to quaff my wine,
As if to-morrow ne'er would shine;
But if to-morrow comes, why then
I'll haste to quaff my wine again.

Be mine the rich perfumes that flow,

To cool and scent my locks of snow.] In the original, μupoɩɩ καταβρεχειν ὑπηνην. On account of this idea of perfuming the beard, Cornelius de Pauw pronounces the whole ode to be the spurious production of some lascivious monk, who was nursing his beard with unguents. But he should have known, that this was an ancient eastern custom, which, if we may believe Savary, still exists: "Vous voyez, Monsieur (says this traveller), que l'usage antique de se parfumer la tête et la barbe*, célébré par le prophète Roi, subsiste encore de nos jours." Lettre 12. Savary likewise cites this very ode of Anacreon. Angerianus has not thought the idea inconsistent, having introduced it in the following lines:

Hæc mihi cura, rosis et cingere tempora myrto,

Et curas multo delapidare mero.

Hæc mihi cura, comas et barbam tingere succo
Assyrio et dulces continuare jocos.

This be my care, to wreathe my brow with flowers,
To drench my sorrows in the ample bowl;
To pour rich perfumes o'er my beard in showers,
And give full loose to mirth and joy of soul!

.

"* Sicut unguentum in capite quod descendit in barbam Aaronis, Pseaume 133."

And thus while all our days are bright,
Nor time has dimm'd their bloomy light,
Let us the festal hours beguile

With mantling cup and cordial smile;
And shed from each new bowl of wine
The richest drop on Bacchus' shrine.

For Death may come, with brow unpleasant,
May come, when least we wish him present,
And beckon to the sable shore,

And grimly bid us - drink no more!

ODE IX.

I PRAY thee, by the gods above,
Give me the mighty bowl I love,
And let me sing, in wild delight,
"I will — I will be mad to-night!"

Alcmæon once, as legends tell,

Was frenzied by the fiends of hell;
Orestes too, with naked tread,

Frantic pac'd the mountain-head;

And why? a murder'd mother's shade
Haunted them still where'er they strayed.

The poet is here in a frenzy of enjoyment, and it is, indeed, "amabilis insania;

Furor di poesia,

Di lascivia, e di vino,

Triplicato furore,

Bacco, Apollo, et Amore.

Ritratti del Cavalier Marino.

This is truly, as Scaliger expresses it,

Insanire dulce

Et sapidum furere furorem.