Customer Reviews

Lays of Ancient Rome

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Then out spake brave Horatius,/ The Captain of the Gate:/ ``To every man upon this earth/ Death cometh soon or late./ And how can man die better/ Than facing fearful odds,/ For the ashes of his fathers,/ And the temples of his gods/ ... Then none was for a party;/ Then all were for the state;/ Then the great man helped the poor,/ And the poor man loved the great:/ Then lands were fairly portioned;/ Then spoils were fairly sold:/ The Romans were like brothers/ In the brave days of old./ Now Roman is to Roman/ More hateful than a foe,/ And the Tribunes beard the high,/ And the Fathers grind the low./ As we wax hot in faction,/ In battle we wax cold:/ Wherefore men fight not as they fought/ In the brave days of old./

I have not read all of the lays, but Horatius at the Bridge stirs me in ways that I cannot explain. What a deeply moving, inspirational poem. This should be required reading in every school in America. And required to be memorized in every service academy.

Thomas Macauley actually wrote two of these books, with very similar titles. This is the first, "Lays of Ancient Rome."

The second, "GREAT Lays of Ancient Rome," is a lot more interesting, and completely different in character. Chapter One, "Julia," will knock your socks off, although Chapter 7, "Lucretia," wouldn't be seen as politically correct anymore.

"Then Romans in Rome's Quarrel, Spared neither Land nor Gold, nor Son nor Wife, nor Limb nor Life, in the Brave Days of Old."

"Was none who would be foremost to lead such dire attack; but those behind cried, 'Forward!' and those before cried, 'Back!' And backward now and forward wavers the deep array; and on the tossing sea of steel, to and frow the standards reel; and the victorious trumpet-peal dies fitfully away."


Great poetry like this, when the meanest poetry was reckoned greater than the greatest prose, doesn't show its head anymore. Lord Macaulay was a master, not only because as a Baron he had the leisure to cultivate his talent, but because he was also a politician and a moralist, and was convinced that art should be just as much uplifting and moralizing as it was beautiful.

Between Macaulay and Milton, a young person can grasp the scope and beauty of this much-diminished art form.

THE GIFT THE AUTHOR HAS TELLING ME OF HORATIUS IS BEAUTIFUL. THE WORDS THAT HE USES BECOME A SCENIC PICTURE THT ENTRANCES MY MIND AND CAPTURES MY SENSES. I WOULD LOVE TO SEE THE LAND THAT HE SPEAKS OF AND FEEL AS IF I HAVE BEEN THERE IN MY MIND. HE IS ELOQUANT AND POETIC AND EVEN THE HORRIBLE BATTLES ARE BEAUTIFUL!

Something of a pastiche, Macaulay's effort at a version of folk poetry based on early Roman history is hardly great poetry but is enjoyable and somewhat revealing. These efforts fall squarely in the mainstream of rather romanticized efforts to recover an authentic "folk" voice. At the same time, Macaulay approaches this work with a relatively sophisticated knowledge of Roman history and Medieval literature. But why Rome and not, for example, Macaulay's England? Beyond the heavy emphasis on Classical literature in Macaulay's Britain, there is also the British conception of itself as a new Rome. Some parts of these poems betray concerns also about social and class stratification of Victorian Britain.

All texts available at Project Gutenberg for free.

THE GIFT THE AUTHOR HAS TELLING ME OF HORATIUS IS BEAUTIFUL. THE WORDS THAT HE USES BECOME A SCENIC PICTURE THT ENTRANCES MY MIND AND CAPTURES MY SENSES. I WOULD LOVE TO SEE THE LAND THAT HE SPEAKS OF AND FEEL AS IF I HAVE BEEN THERE IN MY MIND. HE IS ELOQUANT AND POETIC AND EVEN THE HORRIBLE BATTLES ARE BEAUTIFUL!