You can see where the perverse imitation of Catullus has conducted a Christian, in other respects devout, so that in discussing a Christian fast day he had no fear of using the profane name of Jove. But, leaving this aside, what is more inept than the verse _Harsh and troublesome, by Jupiter!_, however Catullan. Nevertheless, Borbonius thought his epigram concluded elegantly in that line because he found in Catullus a similar one.[39] But, leaving aside such spiritless imitators, one can truly affirm of those ideas that conclude epigrams that there is a good deal of elegance in them when they are themselves distinguished and nicely cohere with the preceding chain of thought. For, since nothing so sticks in the reader's mind as the conclusion, what is better than to put there what especially you want to fix in his soul. Consequently, those epigrams are rightly censured as faulty that go in the order of anti-climax or in which the conclusion is sort of added on or appended to the rest and does not neatly develop out of the preceding verses. This fault is discernible in the following epigram, though in other respects it is distinguished: You that a stranger in mid-Rome seek Rome And can find nothing in mid-Rome of Rome, Behold this mass of walls, these abrupt rocks, Where the vast theatre lies overwhelmed. Here, here is Rome! Look how the very corpse Of greatness still imperiously breathes threats! The world she conquered, strove herself to conquer, Conquered that nothing be unconquered by her. Now conqueror Rome's interred in conquered Rome, And the same Rome conquered and conqueror. Still Tiber stays, witness of Roman fame, Still Tiber flows on swift waves to the sea. Learn hence what Fortune can: the unmoved falls, And the ever-moving will remain forever.[40] The last four verses are completely unnecessary and contain a frigid point by which the lustre of the preceding is dimmed. _The material of epigrams; thence the division into different kinds. The first kind and the second._ The material of epigrams comprises any subject and anything that can be said on it--in fact, there are as many kinds of epigrams as there are kinds of things that can be said. We will notice here particularly those kinds from which the special powers of each can be understood. There is, then, a kind of epigram that is elevated, weighty, sublime, pursuing a noble subject in noble lines and concluding with a noble sentiment. Such is Martial's on Scaevola: That hand that sought a king and found a slave Was thrust to burn up in the sacred fire: So cruel a portent the good enemy Appalled, who bade him carried from the fire. The hand the regicide endured to burn, The king could not endure to see it done. Greater the glory of the hand deceived! Had it not erred it had accomplished less.[41]