58. _Ad Cœlium de Lesbia_. In this ode, addressed to one of her former admirers, Catullus gives an account, both tender and pathetic, of the debaucheries and degraded condition of Lesbia, to his passion for whom, he had attributed such powerful effects in the above imitation of Sappho. 61. _In Nuptias Juliæ et Manlii_. We come now to the three celebrated epithalamiums of Catullus. The first is in honour of the nuptials of Julia and Manlius, who is generally supposed to have been Aulus Manlius Torquatus, an intimate friend of the poet, and a descendant of one of the most noble patrician families in Rome. This poem has been entitled an Epithalamium in most of the ancient editions, but Muretus contends that this is an improper appellation, and that it should be inscribed _Carmen Nuptiale_. “An epithalamium,” he says, “was supposed to be sung by the virgins when the bride had retired to the nuptial chamber, whereas in this poem an earlier part of the ceremony is celebrated and described.” This earlier part, indeed, occupies the greater portion of the poem, but towards the conclusion the bride is represented as placed in the chamber of her husband, which may justify its ordinary title: “Jam licet venias, Marite; Uxor in thalamo est tibi,” &c. In this bridal song the poet first addresses Hymen; and as the bride was now about to proceed from her paternal mansion to the house of her husband, invokes his aid in raising the nuptial hymn. He then describes the bride:— “Floridis velut enitens Myrtus Asià ramulis; Quos Hamadryades Deæ Ludicrum sibi roscido Nutriunt humore.” A similar image is frequent with other poets, and has been adopted by Pontanus(495) and Naugerius(496). The praises of Hymen follow next:— “Nil potest sine te Venus, Fama quod bona comprobet, Commodi capere: at potest Te volente. Quis huic Deo Compararier ausit? Nulla quit sine te domus Liberos dare, nec parens Stirpe jungier: at potest Te volente. Quis huic Deo Compararier ausit?” Claudian, in his epithalamium on the nuptials of Palladius and Celerina, and the German poet Lotichius, extol Hymen in terms similar to those employed in the first of the above stanzas: and the advantages he confers, alluded to in the second, have been beautifully touched on by Milton, as also by Pope, in his chorus of youths and virgins, forming part of the Duke of Buckingham’s intended tragedy—_Brutus_: “But Hymen’s kinder flames unite, And burn for ever one, Chaste as cold Cynthia’s virgin light, Productive as the sun. “O source of every social tye, United wish and mutual joy, What various joys on one attend! As son, as father, brother, husband, friend.”