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EPIGRAM
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EPIGRAM , properly speaking, anything that is inscribed. Nothing could be more hopeless, however, than an See also:attempt to discover or devise a See also:definition wide enough to include the vast multitude of little poems which at one See also:time or other have been honoured with the See also:title of epigram, and precise enough to exclude all others. Without taking See also:account of its evident misapplications, we find that the name has been given—first, in strict accordance with its See also:Greek See also:etymology, to any actual inscription on See also:monument, statue or See also:building; secondly, to verses never intended for such a purpose, but assuming for See also:artistic reasons the epigraphical See also:form; thirdly, to verses expressing with something of the terseness of an inscription a striking or beautiful thought; and fourthly, by unwarrantable restriction, to a little poem ending in a "point," especially of the satirical See also:kind. The last of these has obtained considerable popularity from the well-known lines " The qualities rare in a See also:bee that we meet In an epigram never should fail; The See also:body should always be little and sweet, And a sting should be See also:left in its tail " which represent the older Latin of some unknown writer—" Omne epigramma sit instar See also:apis: sit aculeus illi; Sint sua mella; sit et corporis exigui." Attempts not a few of a more elaborate kind have been made to See also:state the essential See also:element of the epigram, and to classify existing specimens; but, as every See also:lover of epigrams must feel, most of them have been attended with very partial success. See also:Scaliger, in the third See also:book of his Poetics, gives a fivefold See also:division, which displays a certain ingenuity in the nomenclature but is very superficial: the first class takes its name from mel, or See also:honey, and consists of adulatory specimens; the second from fel, or See also:gall; the third from acetum, or See also:vinegar; and the See also:fourth from sal, or See also:salt; while the fifth is styled the condensed, or multiplex. This See also:classification is adopted by Nicolaus Mercerius in his De conscribendo epigrammate (See also:Paris, 1653); but he supplemented it by another of much more scientific value, based on the figures of the See also:ancient rhetoricians. See also:Lessing, in the See also:preface to his own epigrams, gives an interesting treatment of the theory, his See also:principal See also:doctrine being practically the same as that of several of his less eminent predecessors, that there ought to be two parts more or less clearly distinguished,—the first awakening the reader's See also:attention in the same way as an actual monument might do, and the other satisfying his curiosity in some unexpected manner. An attempt was made by See also:Herder to increase the comprehensiveness and precision of the theory; but as he him-self confesses, his classification is rather vague—the expository, the paradigmatic, the pictorial, the impassioned, the artfully turned, the illusory, and the See also:swift. After all, if the arrangement according to authorship be rejected, the simplest and most satisfactory is according to subjects. The epigram is one of the most See also:catholic of See also:literary forms, and lends itself to the expression of almost any feeling or thought. It may be an See also:elegy, a See also:satire, or a love-poem in See also:miniature, an embodiment ' For an See also:illustration, see Kathleen Schlesinger, Orchestral See also:Instruments, See also:part ii. " Precursors of the See also:Violin See also:Family," fig. 165, p. 219. s See also:Athenaeus, iv. p. 183 d. and xiv. p. 638 a. 3 Dialogo See also:delta musica antica e moderna, ed. 1602, p. 4o.of the See also:wisdom of the ages, a bon-mot set off with a couple of rhymes. " I cannot tell thee who lies buried here; No See also:man that knew him followed by his bier; The winds and waves conveyed him to this See also:shore, Then ask the winds and waves to tell thee more." See also:ANONYMOUS-" Wherefore should I vainly try To See also:teach thee what my love will be In after years, when See also:thou and I Have both grown old in See also:company, If words are vain to tell thee how, See also:Mary, I do love thee now? Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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