A History of Roman Literature

by Harold North Fowler

When drafts of nectar have relaxed his soul.

Now trifles pass. My giddy Muse would fear

Jove to approach in morning mood severe.[101]

Among the many learned writers of this period the most important is the elder Pliny. Pliny the elder. Gaius Plinius Secundus was born at Novum Comum, in northern Italy, in 23 A. D. At an early age he went to Rome, where he came under the influence of Pomponius Secundus, whose example may have led him to combine public service with diligent study and authorship. Pliny’s life was passed in the service of the state. He was an officer in the cavalry, serving in Germany and perhaps also in Syria; he was a trusted counsellor and agent of Vespasian, and held at different times the important post of procurator or governor in several provinces. His nephew mentions especially his procuratorship in Spain. These various and important official duties did not, however, withdraw Pliny’s mind from his studies. When he was carried in the litter through the streets in the evening, after his official duties were performed, while he was bathing, and at his meals, he read or was read to constantly. He believed that no book was so poor as not to contain something worth recording, and therefore he took notes of all he read. At his death he left one hundred and sixty rolls of manuscript notes, closely written on both sides. With all this reading Pliny was not a mere bookworm, but a practical man of affairs and an interested observer of men and things about him. His zeal for knowledge cost him his life; for when the great eruption of Vesuvius took place, in 79 A. D., Pliny, who was in command of the fleet at Misenum, went in a war galley to the neighborhood of the volcano to investigate the strange phenomenon and to aid those in peril, landed, and finally succumbed to the ashes and noxious gases. The description of this event is the most interesting of the letters of his nephew, the younger Pliny.

The result of Pliny’s diligence is seen in his great encyclopædic work, the Natural History, in thirty-seven books. In this he undertakes to describe the whole realm of nature in a systematic way. The first book consists of a table of contents with a list of the authors consulted. The Natural History. Then follow in order the general mathematical and physical description of the universe, geography and ethnology, anthropology, zoology, botany, and mineralogy. Under mineralogy the uses of metals and stones are described, and this leads to a valuable history of painting and sculpture. The Natural History is written for the most part in a simple, straightforward style, though with occasional lapses from good taste, but it is not a great work of literature. Its importance lies in the information it contains. In the first book, Pliny mentions nearly five hundred authors from whom his information is derived, but as he also speaks of one hundred chosen ones whose works he consulted, it is evident that his authorities fall into two classes. Apparently he really consulted about one hundred, but recorded in the first book the names of other writers to whom his real authorities referred. Pliny is almost the only ancient writer who tries to give much information about the sources of his knowledge, but it is often difficult, if not impossible, even in his case to be sure from what source a particular statement is derived. In general, it is clear that Pliny was a careful worker, and his statements can, as a rule, be accepted as true. The great work was ready for publication in 77 A. D. and was sent to Titus with an interesting preface. But even after this, Pliny continued to add the results of further reading or observation. His death came upon him in the midst of his work. Pliny’s other works. Pliny was also the author of several other works, the most important of which were the History of the German Wars, in twenty books, and a history From the End of the History of Aufidius Bassus, in thirty-one books. Just what period this work embraced is not certain, but the suggestion that each book treated of one year and that the whole was a history of the years 41-71 A. D. is not improbable. These works, as well as Pliny’s lesser writings, are lost, but they served at least to supply material to Tacitus, who cites the German Wars, and to other historians.

Of the technical writings of this period only two now exist: the Stratagems (Strategemata) and the treatise on the Roman aqueducts (De Aquis Urbis Romæ Libri II), by Sextius Julius Frontinus, a man of some distinction, who was prætor in 70 A. D., consul several times, and was appointed Curator Aquarum, or overseer of the water supply of Rome, in 97 A. D. Frontinus. Various writers. His writings belong rather to the history of technical studies than to that of literature. The names of several authors of memoirs of travels, legal treatises, speeches, histories, and technical writings of various kinds are known to us, but their works are lost or only partially preserved as unsatisfactory fragments. The schools of grammar and rhetoric continued to exist, and many teachers of these subjects enjoyed considerable reputation. The greatest among them, and the only one whose work has survived to modern times, is Quintilian, the last, and in some respects the greatest, of the Spanish writers of Rome.

Marcus Fabius Quintilianus was born at Calagurris, in Spain, about 35 A. D. He was educated at Rome under the most distinguished teachers of the time, and when his education was completed returned to his native place. Quintilian. But in 68 A. D., Galba, who had been governor in Spain before he became emperor, called Quintilian to Rome. Here he became a teacher of rhetoric, and received a salary from the imperial treasury. At the same time he was a prominent barrister, but published only one speech, though others were published without his authority from shorthand reports. He was a man of great influence, and was even raised to the consulship by Domitian, who had appointed him tutor of his grandnephews. After teaching for twenty years he gave up his school and devoted himself to the composition of his great work, the Institutio Oratoria. This was published about 93 A. D. An earlier work, On the Reasons for the Decay of Oratory (De Causis Corruptæ Eloquentiæ), is lost. Quintilian’s private life was not free from trouble. He married at an advanced age, but his wife died when only eighteen years old, his younger son soon after at the age of five, and his elder son after a brief interval at the age of nine. When Quintilian died is not known, but he can hardly have lived long after 100 A. D.

The title Institutio Oratoria, given by Quintilian to his work, designates it as a text-book of oratory. Institutio Oratoria. But it is no mere technical treatise on the art of speaking. Quintilian was an enthusiastic lover of his profession, and believed that oratory was the highest expression of human thought and human life. Like Cato, he demanded that the orator be not merely a good speaker, but also, and first of all, a good man. He must also have a general literary education before proceeding to the technical study of oratory.

Owing to this large conception of the qualities of the orator, Quintilian’s great work became a general and very important treatise on education. Its arrangement is as follows: the first book treats of the elements of education and contains many interesting observations upon family life; the fundamental principles of rhetoric are treated in the second book, which carries on the discussion of the purposes and methods of education; the next five books (III-VII) deal exhaustively with the matter of oratory under the main heads of invention and disposition or arrangement, and are for the most part strictly technical; four books (VIII-XI) treat of expression and all that is included in the word style with a discussion of memorizing and delivery; and the last book (XII), now that the theory of oratory is expounded, reverts to the orator himself, and discusses the moral qualities and the continuous self-discipline which alone can make the orator great.