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a form very different from that which either passion singly would impress? Does not the expression participate of the character of each? Is there no difference, but in degree, between the aspect of a man oppressed by fear, and of one disturbed by complexional timidity, yet supported against its influence by rational self-discipline? The countenance of Coriolanus, during the supplication of his mother and wife, must have passed through a series of expressions from that of an assumed cold stateliness, with which he covered his feelings, till when overpowered by natural affection his eyes did sweat compassion. Through the whole of this conflict, at no time did his countenance indicate an unmixed emotion, and even at the concluding triumph of filial duty, the great interpreter of nature hath represented him distracted almost to agony:

Oh, my mother, mother! oh!

You have won a happy victory to Rome:
But for your son-Believe it, oh, believe it—
Most dangerously you have with him prevail'd,
If not most mortal to him. But let it come.

Andromache Saxgvoer yeλaoxoa (6 Iliad, 484.) readily occurs as a beautiful illustration of the power of the countenance to express blended feelings*; it does not however appear to me to come so near the essence of this question as to be competent to support the decision of it. A variety of soft images rushed at once upon the mind of Andromache: her heart was melted with a recollection of the many tender circumstances that form the aggregate of domestic happiness; and Hector's perilous station excited a fear of losing him who supported this happiness; the little incident of infant terror quickens this mass of tenderness; yet these several emotions, being of a kindred nature, easily coalesce into one united charity. Mingled tears and smiles are often marks of the affectionate feeling, though on most occasions they denote contrary passions.

Perhaps the following may be a more apposite instance; Junius Brutus is graphically described by Livy as presiding at the capital punishment of his sons, whom he had condemned to die: "et qui spectator erat amovendus, eum ipsum fortuna exactorem supplicii dedit.

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* In like manner " Death (in Par. Lost) grinn'd horrible a ghastly smile.”

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inter omne tempus pater, vultus et os ejus, spectaculo esset But what appearance in the countenance of Brutus so strongly interested the attention of the beholders? They surely saw something more than the expression of a father's heart wounded by the sufferings of his sons. They traced a severe internal conflict; they observed visibly charactered in his face the vigorous but ineffectual efforts of nature to burst the restraints with which stern republican justice had fettered her yearnings; eminente patrio animo inter publica pana ministerium.

Were the great master, who harrowed our souls with sympathy for the woes of Ugolino, to delineate this awful scene, the power of his pencil would prove, that in one instance his decision had been ill-founded.

1785, Jan.

RAPOTENSIS.

LXXXII. Critique on the Word Purpureus.

MR. URBAN,

London, June 4, 1782.

IN reading Latin authors we scarcely meet with any passages so obscure as those which relate to colours. We see the same word applied as an epithet to such opposite things; and, consequently, we see such opposite meanings assigned to the same word, that we are inclined to doubt whether the signification be "albus an ater." Thus the word "purpureus" is applied to fire, air, and water, as well as to swans and snow. It seems, at the first view, almost impossible to settle the idea which the ancients intended to convey by this word. I shall endeavour to clear away part of this difficulty.

In the first place, it appears evidently that purpureus very often conveyed the same idea with our purple: and this was its literal and original meaning. Thus,

"Purpureos flores."

Virg. Geor. iv. 54.

"Cum tibi succurrit Veneris lascivia nostræ;
Purpureas tenero pollice tange genas."

Ovid. 1. Amor, iv. 21.

"Purpureus ignis."

Stat. 1. Achil. 162.

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In the next place, I imagine the ancients thought purpureus properly applied to that matter which was eminent for its shining qualities, of what colour soever it might be this I take to have been its metaphorical or figurative meaning.

"Tempestivius in domum
Pauli, purpureis ales oloribus,
Comissabere Maximi."

4 Carm. i. 9.

"Pur

On which passage Baxter has the following note. pureum pro pulchro poetæ dicere assueverunt." (Vet. Schol.) "Albinovano etiam nix purpurea dicitur. Quicquid late splendebat et candebat per catachresin purpureum dicebatur: illud enim in coloribus summum erat." This, I think, is in general the idea meant to be conveyed by purpureus. Let us examine it in two or three passages. Ovid, speaking of the horses of the sun, has these words:

"Gemmea purpureis cum juga demet equis.”

And in another place,

Fast. ii. 74.

"Carmina sanguineæ deducunt cornua lunæ,
Et revocant niveos solis euntis equos."

Lib. 2. Amor. Eleg. i. 24.

One would think it almost impossible to reconcile the two epithets, purpureos and niveos, which are here applied to the same animals by the same person. However, I think the passages may be perfectly understood by considering Baxter's explication of purpureus. I am persuaded that the poet, alluding to the appearance of the sun itself, meant to say, that the horses made a bright, shining, and splendid figure; and this without wishing to point out any particular colour. I am the more inclined to be of this opinion, because Val. Flaccus, speaking of the same horses, calls them "nitentes equos," lib. v. 415. Ovid has "diem purpureum ;' and Virgil and Tibullus, "purpureum ver." (Ovid. 3 Fast. 518; Virg. Ecl. ix. 40; Tibul. iii. 5. 4.) I see no other way, in these passages, of translating purpureus, except "splendid, shining."

In Persius are the following lines:

"Magis auratis pendens laquearibus ensis
Purpureus subter cervices terruit*."

Sat. iii. 40.

Did I imagine ensis purpureus to be the true reading, I should infer much from hence in favour of my opinion, since I see no other reason why a sword, which is not stained with blood, should be called purpureus, except on account of its shining qualities. But I am intirely in favour of the other reading of this passage:

Purpureas subter cervices:

ensis

that is, "the sword which was hung over the head of Damocles, dressed in kingly garments"-regio ornatu amictus. Horace, speaking of those heroes, who for the greatness of their actions were received into the highest heaven, thus anticipates the deification of Augustus:

"Quos inter Augustus recumbens
Purpureo bibit ore nectar."

3 Carm. iii. 11.

It is well known that Augustus's vanity led him to imagine that his eyes beamed forth light after the manner in which Apollo is described. This weakness Horace here flatters: the purpureum os means that radiant countenance, that "quiddam divini vigoris," which Augustus imagined he so peculiarly possessed. In the same strain of flattery Virgil speaks of Æneas, the representative of Augustus:

-"Haud illo (Apollo) segnior ibat Æneas; tantum egregio decus enitet ore."

And again;

iv. 149.

"Os humerosque deo similis. Namque ipsa (Venus) de

coram

Cæsariem nato genitrix, lumenque juventa
-Purpureum; et lætos oculis afflarat honores."

i. 589.

Persius here alludes to the well known story of Damocles, over whose head a naked sword was hung by a single horsehair, by order of Dionysius the tyrant. See Cic. Tusc. Quæst. lib. v.

In these passages purpureus seems, as before, to signify splendid, shining. With the same signification, Övid, speaking of Minos, calls him purpureus.

"Cum vero faciem demto nudaverat ære,

Purpureusque

Terga premebat equi."

Met. viii. 32.

To the above examples, which I have brought to prove the meaning of purpureus, I shall add an argument from Rodellius. Why should not purpureus, says he, signify shining, since "simili ratione multa vocamus aurea, in quibus auri nihil est, præter pulchritudinem et nitorem?

Having, in some measure, pointed out by the foregoing examples the meaning of purpureus, I shall here attempt to account for its figurative signification. The word "purpureus" is derived from purpura, and was originally applied to that which possessed the qualities of the purpura. This purpura was a species of shell-fish, within whose head is the liquor used in dying purple. Now purple garments were the marks of the highest dignities, and were worn by princes and kings, and also by the chief Roman magistrates. It is hence their writers use purpuræ to express the highest offices, as well as the persons who were dignified with these offices*. When, therefore, purpura thus deviated from its literal to a figurative sense, it was likely that purpureus should also alter its signification; and that when purpura came to signify that which was splendid and remarkable for its superior distinctions, purpureus also would then be applied to that which was possessed of these distinctions. Hence I think the reason why, among the Latins, purpureus was applied to such different, nay opposite things, since it was rightly said of whatever had

Thus "septima purpurâ" is used by Florus for "septimo consulatu," 3. xxi. 17. Pliny, lib. x. 21, has "Romana purpura" for "Romani magistratus." Mart. lib. viii. 8.

And Ovid;

"Purpura te felix, te colit omnis honos,"

"Jamque novi præeunt fasces, nova purpura fulget."
1 Fast. 81

"Illum non populi fasces, non purpura regum
Flexit."

Virg. 2 Georg. 495.

From whence the expression" attingere purpuram," 966 sumere purpuram," &c,

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