The Works of Lord Byron. Vol. 6Byron, George Gordon Byron, Baron
General
The Works of Lord Byron. Vol. 6
Byron, George Gordon Byron, Baron
English poetry
Ovid's a rake, as half his verses show him,
Anacreon's morals are a still worse sample,
Catullus scarcely has a decent poem,
I don't think Sappho's Ode a good example,
Although Longinus[41] tells us there is no hymn
Where the Sublime soars forth on wings more ample;
But Virgil's songs are pure, except that horrid one
Beginning with _"Formosum Pastor Corydon."_[42]
XLIII.
Lucretius' irreligion is too strong
For early stomachs, to prove wholesome food;
I can't help thinking Juvenal was wrong,
Although no doubt his real intent was good,
For speaking out so plainly in his song,
So much indeed as to be downright rude;
And then what proper person can be partial
To all those nauseous epigrams of Martial?
XLIV.
Juan was taught from out the best edition,
Expurgated by learned men, who place,
Judiciously, from out the schoolboy's vision,
The grosser parts; but, fearful to deface
Too much their modest bard by this omission,[k]
And pitying sore his mutilated case,
They only add them all in an appendix,[43]
Which saves, in fact, the trouble of an index;
XLV.
For there we have them all "at one fell swoop,"
Instead of being scattered through the pages;
They stand forth marshalled in a handsome troop,
To meet the ingenuous youth of future ages,
Till some less rigid editor shall stoop
To call them back into their separate cages,
Instead of standing staring all together,
Like garden gods--and not so decent either.
XLVI.
The Missal too (it was the family Missal)
Was ornamented in a sort of way
Which ancient mass-books often are, and this all
Kinds of grotesques illumined; and how they,
Who saw those figures on the margin kiss all,
Could turn their optics to the text and pray,
Is more than I know--But Don Juan's mother
Kept this herself, and gave her son another.
XLVII.
Sermons he read, and lectures he endured,
And homilies, and lives of all the saints;
To Jerome and to Chrysostom inured,
He did not take such studies for restraints;
But how Faith is acquired, and then insured,
So well not one of the aforesaid paints
As Saint Augustine in his fine Confessions,
Which make the reader envy his transgressions.[44]
XLVIII.
This, too, was a sealed book to little Juan--
I can't but say that his mamma was right,
If such an education was the true one.
She scarcely trusted him from out her sight;
Her maids were old, and if she took a new one,
You might be sure she was a perfect fright;
She did this during even her husband's life--
I recommend as much to every wife.
XLIX.
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