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Sometimes I wonder if I am not sticking with the major mostly to enjoy the crazy and cringeworthy of the 19th century trying to acceptibilify their texts.
From the commentary to Cicero's recap of Caesar in Catiline IV:
(NB: as Cicero quotes it, C's arguments are pretty Epicurean, with the exception of "and so some particularly brave men even seek death out.")
My favorite part is the exclamation point, which I first read as applying to the idea of calling those imbued with "philosophic principles" wise, although I suppose it is better taken as amazement that these principles could be considered true.
I also am fond of, but a bit confused by how "peculiar" they find the idea of death-is-not-to-be-feared. I am sure that a school commentator wouldn't want to seem to espouse Epicureanism, or really, anything not Christianity, and I suppose it is sort of implied that death is nullity, and not just absence of punishment for the wicked, but the commentary still comes across as saying "isn't it queer, the idea that dire punishments don't await after death?" Obviously, Jonathan Edwards would disapprove of no fiery pit, but by 1840? I guess my experience with Victorians and death has mostly been poetry of the sappy, infants and rosebuds, and eternal crowns of glory with the angels variety.
It is particularly weird, actually, in that they are pretty okay with Cicero dismissing fables of infernal punishment in the next section as fables for the coercement of the populace.
From the commentary to Cicero's recap of Caesar in Catiline IV:
4. Sapientes. By the "wise" are here meant those imbued with what Caear regards as the true principles of philosophy! [stuff about Stocicism] ... Caesar, who was an Epicurean, if he was any thing [sic] at all, artfully avails himself of the fact that many of the Stoic sect having actually put an end to their existence, and applies it to the establishment of his peculiar doctrine.
(NB: as Cicero quotes it, C's arguments are pretty Epicurean, with the exception of "and so some particularly brave men even seek death out.")
My favorite part is the exclamation point, which I first read as applying to the idea of calling those imbued with "philosophic principles" wise, although I suppose it is better taken as amazement that these principles could be considered true.
I also am fond of, but a bit confused by how "peculiar" they find the idea of death-is-not-to-be-feared. I am sure that a school commentator wouldn't want to seem to espouse Epicureanism, or really, anything not Christianity, and I suppose it is sort of implied that death is nullity, and not just absence of punishment for the wicked, but the commentary still comes across as saying "isn't it queer, the idea that dire punishments don't await after death?" Obviously, Jonathan Edwards would disapprove of no fiery pit, but by 1840? I guess my experience with Victorians and death has mostly been poetry of the sappy, infants and rosebuds, and eternal crowns of glory with the angels variety.
It is particularly weird, actually, in that they are pretty okay with Cicero dismissing fables of infernal punishment in the next section as fables for the coercement of the populace.
