This is rhetoric, but rhetoric of the noblest kind. Of pure poetry there is naturally but little in Juvenal. Neither his temperament nor his subject would admit it. He had too keen an eye for the hideous and the grotesque, too strong a passion for the declamatory style. Hence it is rather his brilliant sketches of a vicious society, his fiery outbursts of rhetoric, his striking _sententiae_ that primarily impress the reader: expende Hannibalem: quot libras in duce summo invenies? (x. 147). Great Hannibal within the balance lay, And count how many pounds his ashes weigh. DRYDEN. finem animae quae res humanas miscuit olim, non gladii, non saxa dabunt nec tela, sed ille Cannarum vindex et tanti sanguinis ultor anulus. i demens et saevas curre per Alpes, ut pueris placeas et declamatio fias (x. 163). What wondrous sort of death has heaven designed For so untamed, so turbulent a mind? Nor swords at hand, nor hissing darts afar, Are doomed to avenge the tedious bloody war; But poison drawn through a ring's hollow plate, Must finish him--a sucking infant's fate. Go, climb the rugged Alps, ambitious fool, To please the boys, and be a theme at school. DRYDEN. nemo repente fuit turpissimus (ii. 83). For none become at once completely vile. GIFFORD. summum crede nefas animam praeferre pudori et propter vitam vivendi perdere causas (viii. 83). si natura negat, facit indignatio versum (i. 79). Think it a crime no tears can e'er efface, To purchase safety with compliance base, At honour's cost a feverish span extend, And sacrifice for life, life's only end! GIFFORD. It is lines such as these that first rise to the mind at the mention of Juvenal. But he was no mere declaimer. Here and there we may find phrases of the purest poetry and of the most perfect form. Far above all others come the wonderful lines of the ninth satire: festinat enim decurrere velox flosculus angustae miseraeque brevissima vitae portio; dum bibimus, dum serta unguenta puellas poscimus, obrepit non intellecta senectus (ix. 126). For youth, too transient flower! of life's short day The shortest part, but blossoms--to decay. Lo! while we give the unregarded hour To revelry and joy in Pleasure's bower, While now for rosy wreaths our brow to twine, While now for nymphs we call, and now for wine, The noiseless foot of time steals swiftly by, And, ere we dream of manhood, age is nigh! GIFFORD.