The style abounds in archaism, alliteration, and assonance. The frequent use of new compounds is a noticeable peculiarity of the diction.
Jerome states that the wife of Lucretius gave him a love-philtre which took away his reason so that, after composing in his lucid intervals several books, which were afterward corrected by Cicero, he died by his own hand.
Sellar is inclined to accept this story as a 'meagre and distorted record of tragical events in the poet's life.' On the basis of this legend and an appreciative study of the De Rerum Natura, Tennyson composed his Lucretius.
For Reference: Sellar, Roman Poets of the Republic, chapters 11-14;
Munro, Text of Lucretius, with Notes and Introduction (4th. edition,
Cambridge, 1886); Mackail, Latin Literature (New York, 1898), pp. 44-
46 (Lucretius as anticipating theories of modern science).
Metre: Dactylic Hexameter, B. 368; A. & G. 615.
1. 2. animi: a locative form, B. 232, 3; A. & G. 358. 3. thyrso: see Lex. II. A and B. 5-10. Often imitated, as by Vergil, Georgics, 3. 291-293. 5, 6. mente…loca: I traverse in blooming thought the pathless haunts of the Pierides.—Munro. 7. iuvat: I love.—Munro. 11,12. artis religionum nodis: Lucretius teaches that, since the gods do not govern the world, all rites of worship are needless, and, since the soul is mortal, punishment after death is not to be feared. Cf. Tennyson, Lucretius:
My golden (cf. aurea, Selection 2. 12) work in which I told a truth
That stays the rolling Ixionian wheel,
And numbs the Fury's ringlet-snake and plucks
The mortal soul from out immortal hell.
Religio is probably derived from the root lig, meaning to bind. The Roman felt his religion to be a fetter upon him. 14. contingens: o'erlaying, a compound of tango.—Munro.
2. 2. commoda: the true interests.—Munro. 3. o…decus: Epicurus, who is praised in many passages. (See Sellar, Roman Poets of the Republic, p. 298 ff.) His bold and, comprehensive thinking is characterized as follows (1. 72-74):
Ergo vivida vis animi pervicit, et extra processit longe flammantia moenia mundi atque omne inmensum peragravit mente animoque.