An Essay on True and Apparent Beauty in which from Settled Principles is Rendered the Grounds for Choosing and Rejecting Epigrams

Transcriber's Note
The Augustan Reprint Society
GENERAL EDITORS
H. Richard Archer, Clark Memorial Library Richard C. Boys, University of Michigan Edward Niles Hooker, University of California, Los Angeles H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., University of California, Los Angeles
ASSISTANT EDITORS
W. Earl Britton, University of Michigan John Loftis, University of California, Los Angeles
ADVISORY EDITORS
Emmett L. Avery, State College of Washington Benjamin Boyce, University of Nebraska Louis I. Bredvold, University of Michigan Cleanth Brooks, Yale University James L. Clifford, Columbia University Arthur Friedman, University of Chicago Samuel H. Monk, University of Minnesota Ernest Mossner, University of Texas James Sutherland, Queen Mary College, London

The scope of the anthology is indicated on the title page, which I translate: A selection of epigrams carefully chosen from the whole range of ancient and modern poets, and so on. With an essay on true and apparent beauty, in which from settled principles is rendered the grounds for choosing and rejecting epigrams. There are added the best sententiae of the ancient poets, chosen sparingly and with severe judgement. With shorter sententiae, or proverbs, Latin, Greek, Spanish, and Italian, drawn both from the chief authors of those languages and from everyday speech .
The difficulty then arose of making the selection serve the purposes both of morality and of judgement. The editor could either gather together all the epigrams that were not obscene, or he could choose only the best. He took in fact both ways: he preserved everything of Catullus and Martial except the cheapest odds and ends and filthiest obscenities, and he applied strict standards of judgement to the rest so that, unless an epigram had literary merit or contained something worth knowing, he felt there was no reason to burden the book with it.
Nevertheless, some middling epigrams found entrance into the anthology—he confesses the fact so the reader will not look for excellence without flaw. The reasons were, first, that the complete perfection he was looking for is seldom or never attained. Hence, if he had admitted only those epigrams in which there was nothing to censure, the task would not have been one of selecting some but rather of rejecting almost all. Again, in epigrams dealing with memorable events or in praise of famous men, sometimes he looked to the profit of the work rather than to its polish, as in Ausonius' quatrains on the Caesars. Finally, he will not deny that chance has played its part against his will. As a judge after a series of severe sentences will give a lighter one to a man no less guilty than the others, so after rejecting a great number of epigrams by some writer a sense of pity arose and a distaste with severity of judgement; then if anything that seemed pointed turned up, though no better than what was rejected, he could not bear to see it discarded. This has occasionally happened, but hardly ever without a warning note to the reader.