Martial's few acres, e'en more blest Than those famed gardens of the West, Lie on Janiculum's long crest; Above the slopes wide reaches hang recessed. The level, gently swelling crown Breathes air from purer heavens blown; When mists the hollow valleys drown 'Tis radiant with a light that's all its own. The clear stars almost seem to lie On the wrought roof that's built so high; The seven hills stand in majesty, And Rome is summed in one wide sweep of eye. Tusculan, Alban hills unfold, Each nook which holds its store of cold. A. E. STREET.
Such a picture is unsurpassed in any language.[665] Statius, with all his brilliance, never came near such perfect success; he lacks sincerity; he can juggle with words against any one, but he never learned their truest and noblest use.
There are many other themes beside landscape painting in which the _Silvae_ of Statius challenge comparison with the epigrams of Martial. Both use the same servile flattery to the emperor, both celebrate the same patrons,[666] both console their noble friends for the loss of relatives, or favourite slaves; both write _propemptica_. Even in the most trivial of these poems, those addressed to the emperor, Statius is easily surpassed by his humbler rival. His inferiority lies largely in the fact that he is more ambitious. He wrote on a larger scale. When the infinitely trivial is a theme for verse, the epigrammatist has the advantage of the author of the more lengthy _Silvae_. Perfect neatness vanquishes dexterous elaboration. Moreover, if taste can be said to enter into such poems at all, Martial errs less grossly. Even Domitian--one might conjecture--may have felt that Statius' flattery was 'laid on with a trowel'. Martial may have used the same instrument, but had the art to conceal it.[667] There are even occasions where his flattery ceases to revolt the reader, and where we forget the object of the flattery. In a poem describing the suicide of a certain Festus he succeeds in combining the dignity of a funeral _laudatio_ with the subtlest and most graceful flattery of the princeps:
indignas premeret pestis cum tabida fauces, inque suos voltus serperet atra lues, siccis ipse genis flentes hortatus amicos decrevit Stygios Festus adire lacus. nec tamen obscuro pia polluit ora veneno aut torsit lenta tristia fata fame, sanctam Romana vitam sed morte peregit dimisitque animam nobiliore via. hanc mortem fatis magni praeferre Catonis fama potest; huius Caesar amicus erat (i. 78).