Trips to the Moon, of Samosata Lucian [ap literature book list TXT] 📗

ludicrously, as Lucian would probably have treated it himself, might open a fine field for wit and humour.  Something of this kind appeared in a newspaper a few years ago, which, I think, was called “News for a Hundred Years Hence;” and though but a rough sketch, was well executed.  A larger work, on the same ground, and by a good hand, might afford much entertainment.

{49} This kind of scholastic jargon was much in vogue in the time of Lucian, and it is no wonder he should take every opportunity of laughing at it, as nothing can be more opposite to true genius, wit, and humour, than such pedantry.

{50} Milo, the Crotonian wrestler, is reported to have been a man of most wonderful bodily strength, concerning which a number of lies are told, for which the reader, if he pleases, may consult his dictionary.  He lost his life, we are informed, by trying to rend with his hands an old oak, which wedged him in, and pressed him to death; the poet says—
                               “—he met his end,
     Wedged in that timber which he strove to rend.”

Titornus was a rival of Milo’s, and, according to Ælian, who is not always to be credited, rolled a large stone with ease, which Milo with all his force could not stir.  Conon was some slim Macaroni of that age, remarkable only for his debility, as was Leotrophides also, of crazy memory, recorded by Aristophanes, in his comedy called The Birds.

{51} The Broughtons of antiquity; men, we may suppose, renowned in their time for teaching the young nobility of Greece to bruise one another secundum artem.

{53a} See Diodorus Siculus, lib. vii., and Plutarch.

{53b} Concerning some of these facts, even recent as they were then with regard to us, historians are divided.  Thucydides and Plutarch tell the story one way, Diodorus and Justin another.  Well might our author, therefore, find fault with their uncertainty.

{55a} Lucian alludes, it is supposed, to Ctesias, the physician to Artaxerxes, whose history is stuffed with encomiums on his royal patron.  See Plutarch’s “Artaxerxes.”

{55b} The Campus Nisæus, a large plain in Media, near the Caspian mountains, was famous for breeding the finest horses, which were allotted to the use of kings only; or, according to Xenophon, those favourites on whom the sovereign thought proper to bestow them.  See the “Cyropæd.,” book viii.

{56} This fine picture of a good historian has been copied by Tully, Strabo, Polybius, and other writers; it is a standard of perfection, however, which few writers, ancient or modern, have been able to reach.  Thuanus has prefixed to his history these lines of Lucian; but whether he, or any other historian, hath answered in every point to the description here given, is, I believe, yet undetermined.

{57a} The saying is attributed to Aristophanes, though I cannot find it there.  It is observable that this proverbial kind of expression, for freedom of words and sentiments, has been adopted into almost every language, though the image conveying it is different.  Thus the Greeks call a fig a fig, etc.  We say, an honest man calls a spade a spade; and the French call “un chat un chat.”  Boileau says, “J’appelle un chat un chat, et Rolet un fripon.”

{57b} Herodotus’s history is comprehended in nine books, to each of which is prefixed the name of a Muse; the first is called Clio, the second Euterpe, and so on.  A modern poet, I have been told, the ingenious Mr. Aaron Hill, improved upon this thought, and christened (if we may properly so call it), not his books, but his daughters by the same poetical names of Miss Cli, Miss Melp-y, Miss Terps-y, Miss Urania, etc.

{58} Both Thucydides and Livy are reprehensible in this particular; and the same objection may be made to Thuanus, Clarendon, Burnet, and many other modern historians.

{59} How just is this observation of Lucian’s, and at the same time how truly poetical is the image which he makes use of to express it!  It puts us in mind of his rival critic Longinus, who, as Pope has observed, is himself the great sublime he draws.

{60} By this very just observation, Lucian means to censure all those writers—and we have many such now amongst us—who take so much pains to smooth and round their periods, as to disgust their readers by the frequent repetition of it, as it naturally produces a tiresome sameness in the sound of them; and at the same time discovers too much that laborious art and care, which it is always the author’s business as much as possible to conceal.

{61} See Homer’s “Iliad,” bk. xiii., 1. 4.

{62a} The famous Lacedæmonian general.  The circumstance alluded to is in Thucydides, bk. iv.

{62b} Gr. ομοχρονειτω, a technical term, borrowed from music, and signifying that tone of the voice which exactly corresponds with the instrument accompanying it.

{66a} A coarse fish that came from Pontus, or the Black Sea.—Saperdas advehe Ponto.  See Pers. Sat. v. 1. 134.

{66b} Here doctors differ.  Several of Thucydides’s descriptions are certainly very long, many of them, perhaps, rather tedious.

{67} Lucian is rather severe on this writer.  Cicero only says, De omnibus omnia libere palam dixit; he spoke freely of everybody.  Other writers, however, are of the same opinion with our satirist with regard to him.  See Dions. Plutarch.  Cornelius Nepos, etc.

{69} Alluding to the story of Diogenes, as related in the beginning.

{75} See Homer’s “Odyssey.”—The strange stories which Lucian here mentions may certainly be numbered, with all due deference to so great a name, amongst the nugæ canoræ of old Homer.  Juvenal certainly considers them in this light when he says:—

     Tam vacui capitis populum Phæaca putavit.

Some modern critics, however, have endeavoured to defend them.

{77} Here the history begins, what goes before may be considered as the author’s preface, and should have been marked as such in the original.

{79} Among the Greek wines, so much admired by ancient Epicures, those of the islands of the Archipelago were the most celebrated, and of these the Chian wine, the product of Chios, bore away the palm from every other, and particularly that which was made from vines growing on the mountain called Arevisia, in testimony of which it were easy, if necessary, to produce an amphora full of classical quotations.

The present inhabitants of that island make a small quantity of excellent wine for their own use and are liberal of it to strangers who travel that way, but dare not, being under Turkish government, cultivate the vines well, or export the product of them.

{81a} In the same manner as Gulliver’s island of Laputa.—From this passage it is not improbable but that Swift borrowed the idea.

{81b} The account which Lucian here gives us of his visit to the moon, perhaps suggested to Bergerac the idea of his ingenious work, called “A Voyage to the Moon.”

{82a} Equi vultures, horse vultures; from ιππος, a horse: and γυψ, a vulture.

{82b} Lucian, we see, has founded his history on matter of fact.  Endymion, we all know, was a king of Elis, though some call him a shepherd.  Shepherd or king, however, he was so handsome, that the moon, who saw him sleeping on Mount Latmos, fell in love with him.  This no orthodox heathen ever doubted: Lucian, who was a freethinker, laughs indeed at the tale; but has made him ample amends in this history by creating him emperor of the moon.

{83a} Modern astronomers are, I, think, agreed, that we are to the moon just the same as the moon is to us.  Though Lucian’s history may be false, therefore his philosophy, we see, was true (1780).  (The moon is not habitable, 1887.)

{83b} This I am afraid, is not so agreeable to the modern system; our philosophers all asserting that the sun is not habitable.  As it is a place, however, which we are very little acquainted with, they may be mistaken, and Lucian may guess as well as ourselves, for aught we can prove to the contrary.

{84} Horse ants, from ιππος, a horse; and μυρμηξ, an ant.

{85a} From λαχανον, olus, any kind of herb; and πτεπον, penna, a wing.

{85b} Millii jaculatores, darters of millet; millet is a kind of small grain.—A strange species of warriors!

{85c} Alliis pugnantes, garlic fighters: these we are to suppose threw garlic at the enemy, and served as a kind of stinkpots.

{85d} Pulici sagittarii, flea-archers.

{85e} Venti cursores, wind courser.

{86a} Passeres glandium, acorn sparrows.

{86b} Equi grues, horse-cranes.

{87a} Air-flies.

{87b} Gr. ’Λεροκορακες, air-crows; but as all crows fly through the air, I would rather read ’Λερκορδακες, which may be translated air-dancers, from κορδαξ, cordax, a lascivious kind of dance, so called.

{88a} Gr. Καυλομυκητες, Caulo fungi, stalk and mushroom men.

{88b} Gr. Κυνοβαλανοι, cani glandacii, acorn-dogs.

{88c} Gr. Νεφελοκενταυροι, nubicentauri, cloud-centaurs.

{88d} The reason for this wish is given a little farther on in the History.

{89} See Hom. Il. II.. 1, 459.

{90a} Some authors tell us that Sagittarius was the same as Chiron the centaur; others, that he was Crocus, a famous hunter, the son of Euphemia, who nursed the Muses, at whose intercession, he was, after his death, promoted to the ninth place in the Zodiac, under the name of Sagittarius.

{90b} The inhabitants of the moon.

{92} A good burlesque on the usual form and style of treaties.

{93} Gr. Πυρωνιδης, ignens, fiery, Φλογιος, flaming, Νυκτωρ, nocturnus, nightly, Μηναιος, menstruus, monthly, Πολυλαμπης, multi lucius, many lights.  These all make good proper names in Greek, and sound magnificently, but do not answer so well in English.  I have therefore preserved the original words in the translation.

{94} Here Lucian, like other story-tellers, is a little deficient in point of memory.  If they eat, as he tells us, nothing but frogs, what use could they have for cheese?

{96} Of which we shall see an account in the next adventure.

{97} The city of Lamps.

{98a} The cloud cuckoo.

{98b} See his comedy of the Birds.

{104a} Salsamentarii: Salt-fish-men.

{104b} Triton-weasels.

{104c} Greek, καρκινορειχες, cancri-mani, crab’s hands.

{104d} Thynno-cipites, tunny-heads, i.e., men with heads like those of the tunny-fish.

{105a} Greek, παγουραδοι, crab-men.

{105b} ψηττοποδες, sparrow-footed, from ψηττα, passer marinus.

{109} Maris potor, the drinker up of the sea.  Æolocentaurus and Thalassopotes were, I suppose, two Leviathans.

{113} One of the fifty Nereids, or Sea-Nymphs; so called, on account of the fairness of her skin: from γαλα, gala, milk; of the milky island, therefore, she was naturally the presiding deity.

{114a} Tyro, according to Homer, fell in love with the famous river Enipeus, and was always wandering on its banks, where Neptune found her, covered her with his waves, and throwing her into a deep sleep, supplied the place of Enipeus.  Lucian has made her amends, by bestowing one of his imaginary kingdoms upon her.  His part of the story, however, is full as probable as the rest.

{114b} Suberipedes, cork-footed.

{116a} This description of the Pagan Elysium, or Island of the Blessed, is well drawn, and abounds in fanciful and picturesque imagery, interspersed with strokes of humour and satire.  The second book is, indeed, throughout, more entertaining and better written than the first.

{116b} See the Ajax Flagellifer of Sophocles.  Lucian humorously degrades him from the character of a hero, and gives him hellebore as a madman.

{118} It is not improbable but that Voltaire’s El Dorado in his “Candide,” might have been suggested to him by this passage.

{119} I.e. Their appearance is exactly like that of shadows made by the sun at noonday, with this only difference, that one lies flat on the ground, the other is erect, and one is dark, the other light or diaphanous.  Our vulgar idea of ghosts, especially with regard to their not being tangible, corresponds with this of Lucian’s.

{121a} A famous musician.  Clemens Alexandrinus gives us a full account of him, to whom I refer the curious reader.

{121b} This poet, we are told, wrote some severe verses on Helen, for which he was punished by Castor and Pollux with loss of sight, but on making his recantation in a palinodia, his eyes were graciously restored to him.  Lucian has affronted her still more grossly by making her run away with Cinyrus; but he, we are to suppose, being not over superstitious, defied the power of Castor and Pollux.

{122a} Nothing appears more ridiculous to a modern reader than the perpetual encomiums on the musical merit of swans and swallows, which we meet with in all the writers of antiquity.  A proper account and explanation of this is, I think, amongst the desiderata of literature.  There is an entertaining tract on this subject in the “Hist. de l’Acad.” tom. v., by M.