History of Roman Literature

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Saco a Terencio y Plauto de mi studio Para que no den voces, porque suele Dar gritos la verdad en libros mudos; Y escribo por el arte que inventaron Los que el vulgar aplauso pretendieron, Porque como los paga el vulgo, es justo Hablarle in uecio para darle gusto. His indulgent conformity, however, to the...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Saco a Terencio y Plauto de mi studio Para que no den voces, porque suele Dar gritos la verdad en libros mudos; Y escribo por el arte que inventaron Los que el vulgar aplauso pretendieron, Porque como los paga el vulgo, es justo Hablarle in uecio para darle gusto. His indulgent conformity, however, to the unpolished taste of his age, ought not to be admitted as an excuse for the obscenities which Plautus has introduced. But though it must be confessed, that he is liable to some censure in this particular, he is not nearly so culpable as has been generally imagined. The commentators, indeed, have been often remarkably industrious in finding out allusions, which do not consist very clearly with the plain and obvious meaning of the context. The editor of the Delphin Plautus has not rejected above five pages from the twenty plays on this account; and many passages even in these could hardly offend the most scrupulous reader. Some of the comedies, indeed, as the Captivi and Tri- nummus, are free from any moral objection; and, with the exception of the Casina, none of them are so indelicate as many plays of Massinger and Ford, in the reign of James I., or Etheridge and Shadwell, in those of Charles II. and his successor. It being the great object of Plautus to excite chapter{{Section 4268 the merriment of the rabble, he, of course, was little anxious about the strict preservation of the dramatic unities, and it was a greater object with him to bring a striking scene into view, than to preserve the unity of place. In the Aulvlaria, part of the action is laid in the miser's house, and part in the various places where he goes to conceal his treasure: in the Mostellaria and Truculentus, the scene changes from the street to apartments in different houses. But, notwithstandi...