Ovid's Metamorphoses: translated by eminent persons. Published by Sir Samuel Garth.

  • Ovid, 43 B.C.-17 A.D. or 18 A.D.
Date:
1794
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Ovid's Metamorphoses: translated by eminent persons. Published by Sir Samuel Garth. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    become so degenerate, as to resign themselves to the will of a capricious tyrant; and the liberty of every individual citizen, was consequently held by the uncertain and precarious tenure of his favour. The real cause of this sudden disgrace, has been variously, but no where satisfactorily accounted for: The ostensible reason was, that Ovid’s loose verses, had corrupted the Roman youth ; but it is allowed on all hands, and is indeed asserted by himself, that this was a mere pretext; in the better and more vir- tuous days of the Republic, while the morals of the people were yet pure, this punishment might have been inflicted with some degree of justice by a Cato, but there was not any thing in the corrupt court of Augustus, that could sanction such a severity. Some have attributed it to a criminal connection with the Empress Livia, some to an intimacy with Julia, her debauched daughter-in-law, and others, to the know- ledge, which the Poet somehow obtained, of the horrid and incestuous intercourse, said to have taken place between the Emperor and his own daughter. But these must be considered as mere conjectures and such was the dread of our author, that he was afraid to disclose the real motive. Certain it is, however, that it was something improper in the family of Augustus, as the Poet himself has inti- mated*. * Trist. Lib. ii. v. 103,