John Conington

John Conington (10 August 1825 – 23 October 1869) was an English classical scholar.

Quotes



 * An inferior artist's only chance of giving pleasure.
 * On rhyme. Preface to The Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace (1863), p. xi.


 * Blank verse really deserving the name I believe to be impossible except to one or two eminent writers in a generation.
 * Preface to The Aeneid of Virgil (1866), p. ix


 * A critical sense of style and of poetic form is not easy to attain, nor is it of first importance for the younger, or, indeed, for any student of Virgil. Wide open to anyone who is willing to learn is the richer knowledge of Virgil as a poet who loved his country and who loved also that humanity which existed before Rome, exists today within ourselves, and will exist long after our own civilization, like that of Virgil's Rome, has become a matter of "ancient history." It is true that the longer one has lived the better one can appreciate a poem which is concerned with life. But the gain that comes to us with the years depends, partly at least, upon the riches we have been willing to extract from literature, which is the experience of other men and women written out. In youth's search for this treasure the Aeneid will be at once a fair haven and a port of departure.
 * Introduction to The Aeneid of Virgil (Chicago and New York: Scott Foresman and Company, 1916), p. 45; partially quoted in School and Home Education, Vol. 35 (1916), p. 172

P. Vergili Maronis Opera

 * The Works of Virgil, with a Commentary by John Conington, M.A.

Volume I (1858)

 * There are few writers whose text is in so satisfactory a state as Virgil's.
 * Preface, p. xi

Volume II (1863)

 * Virgil imitated Homer, but imitated him as a rival, not as a disciple.
 * Introduction, p. 27

The Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace (1863)


Seize the present; trust to-morrow e'en as little as you may.
 * In the moment of our talking, envious time has ebb'd away.
 * Book I, ode xi

The lapse of gliding years to stay, With wrinkled age it nought avails Nor conjures conquering Death away.
 * Ah! Postumus! Devotion fails
 * Book II, ode xiv

The fatal urn has room for all.
 * Death takes the mean man with the proud;
 * Book III, ode i

And lifts him to the gods.
 * No, trust the Muse: she opes the good man's grave,
 * Book IV, ode viii

Book I
The fabric of the Roman state!
 * So vast the labor to create
 * p. 4

Whose stainless virtue all revere, They hush, they list: his clear voice rules Their rebel wills, their anger cools.
 * Then should some man of worth appear
 * p. 10



Has brooked the test of woes; O worse-scarred hearts! these wounds at length The Gods will heal, like those.
 * Comrades and friends! for ours is strength
 * p. 12

A pleasant tale to tell.
 * This suffering will yield us yet
 * p. 12


 * Bear up, and live for happier days.
 * p. 12

Her stately neck's purpureal hue; Ambrosial tresses round her head A more than earthly fragrance shed: Her falling robe her footprints swept, And showed the goddess as she stept.
 * She turned, and flashed upon their view
 * p. 21



That knows not Troy's unhappy lot?'
 * 'Is there, friend,' he cries, 'a spot
 * p. 23

And hearts are touched by human things.
 * E'en here the tear of pity springs,
 * p. 23

Know there are gods who watch o'er right.
 * If men and mortal arms ye slight,
 * p. 27

If justice yet avail for aught; Heaven, and the sense of conscious right, With worthier meed your acts requite!
 * May Heaven, if virtue claim its thought,
 * p. 29

Compassion I have learned to show.
 * Myself not ignorant of woe,
 * p. 31

Book II
You bid me thus revive again.
 * Too cruel, lady, is the pain,
 * p. 39

And setting stars to rest invite.
 * Now dews precipitate the night,
 * p. 39

E'en now, at telling of the tale.
 * I quail,
 * p. 48

And shouts and clarions rend the air.
 * Then come the clamour and the blare,
 * p. 52

And tempt me to a warrior's grave.
 * Fury and wrath within me rave,
 * p. 52


 * 'Tis come, our fated day of death.
 * p. 53

She sat, but sits no more, a queen.
 * We have been Trojans: Troy has been:
 * p. 53

And Death glares grim in many a form.
 * Dire agonies, wild terrors swarm,
 * p. 55

Book III


My speech tongue-tied, my hair upraised.
 * I heard, fear-stricken and amazed,
 * p. 77

What will not men to slake such thirst?
 * Fell lust of gold! abhorred, accurst!
 * p. 77

Fate's book is closed and under seal. For us, alas! that volume stern Has many another page to turn.
 * Live and be blest! 'tis sweet to feel
 * p. 96


 * Snatch him, ye Gods, from mortal eyes!
 * p. 101


 * Huge, awful, hideous, ghastly, blind.
 * p. 103

Book IV



 * Fear proves a base-born soul.
 * p. 109

She chooses to conceal her shame.
 * She calls it marriage now; such name
 * p. 117

By these poor tears, that hand you gave— Since, parting with my woman's pride, My madness leaves me nought beside— By that our wedlock, by the rite Which, but begun, could yet unite, If e'er my kindness held you bound, If e'er in me your joy you found, Look on this falling house, and still, If prayer can touch you, change your will."
 * "From me you fly! Ah! let me crave,
 * p. 123

The thought of Dido shall be sweet.
 * While memory lasts and pulses beat,
 * p. 124

Wreak'st not on those of woman born?
 * Curst Love! what lengths of tyrant scorn
 * p. 127

Is changeful and uncertain still.
 * A woman's will
 * p. 134

The part that Fortune gave.
 * My life is lived, and I have played
 * p. 138

'Yet let me die.'
 * 'To die! and unrevenged!' she said,
 * p. 138

Book V

 * Hush your tongues from idle speech.
 * p. 146


 * They can because they think they can.
 * p. 153

'Tis ours to follow, nothing slack: Whate'er betide, he only cures The stroke of Fortune who endures.
 * My chief, let Fate cry on or back,
 * p. 175

Book VI


I see incarnadined with blood.
 * War, dreadful war, and Tiber flood
 * p. 189

Is prosperous and light: The palace gates of gloomy Dis Stand open day and night: But upward to retrace the way And pass into the light of day There comes the stress of labour; this May task a hero's might.
 * The journey down to the abyss
 * p. 191


 * Back, ye unhallowed!
 * p. 197

Now for a soul prepared.
 * Now for a heart that scorns dismay:
 * p. 197

Darkling and lone their way they made, Through the vast kingdom of the dead, An empty void, though tenanted: So travellers in a forest move With but the uncertain moon above, Beneath her niggard light.
 * Along the illimitable shade
 * p. 197

Wild Sorrow and avenging Care; And pale Diseases cluster there, And pleasureless Decay Foul Penury, and Fears that kill, And Hunger, counsellor of ill, A ghastly presence they: Suffering and Death the threshold keep, And with them Death's blood-brother, Sleep.
 * At Orcus' portals hold their lair
 * p. 197

The will of Fate can overbear.
 * No longer dream that human prayer
 * p. 202

Most like to death, so calm, so deep.
 * A lethargy of sleep,
 * p. 209

His native land for cursed gold.
 * This to a tyrant master sold
 * p. 215

A hundred mouths, and iron lungs, Those types of guilt I could not show, Nor tell the forms of penal woe.
 * No, had I e'en a hundred tongues,
 * p. 215

Green spaces folded in with trees, A paradise of pleasances.
 * They reach the realms of tranquil bliss.
 * p. 215

Who fighting for their country bled; Priests who while earthly life remained Preserved that life unsoiled, unstained; Blest bards, transparent souls and clear, Whose song was worthy Phoebus' ear; Inventors who by arts refined The common lot of human kind, With all who grateful memory won By services to others done: A goodly brotherhood, bedight With coronals of virgin white.
 * Here sees he the illustrious dead
 * p. 217

The durance of our ghostly pain; Then to Elysium we repair, The few, and breathe this blissful air.
 * Each for himself, we all sustain
 * p. 220

The nations far and wide; Be this thy genius, to impose The rule of peace on vanquished foes, Show pity to the humbled soul, And crush the sons of pride.
 * But, Roman, thou, do thou control
 * pp. 225–226

The sorrows of our race! That youth the Fates but just display To earth, nor let him longer stay: With gifts like these for aye to hold, Rome's heart had e'en been overbold. Ah! what a groan from Mars's plain Shall o'er the city sound! How wilt thou gaze on that long train, Old Tiber, rolling to the main Beside his new-raised mound! No youth of Ilium's seed inspires With hope as fair his Latian sires: Nor Rome shall dandle on her knee A nursling so adored as he. O piety! O ancient faith! O hand untamed in battle scathe! No foe had lived before his sword, Stemmed he on foot the war's red tide Or with relentless rowel gored His foaming charger's side. Dear child of pity! shouldst thou burst The dungeon-bars of Fate accurst, Our own Marcellus thou!
 * Ah son! compel me not to speak
 * pp. 226–227

One all of horn, they say, Through which authentic spectres gain Quick exit into day, And one which bright with ivory gleams, Whence Pluto sends delusive dreams.
 * Sleep gives his name to portals twain;
 * p. 228

Book VIII

 * Terror wings his flight.
 * p. 280

And fit thee to ascend the skies, Nor be a poor man's courtesies Rejected or disdained.
 * Thou too take courage, wealth despise,
 * p. 286

The strength I had in days of yore!
 * Ah! would but Jupiter restore
 * p. 294

Have pity on a father's love And hear Evander's prayer: If 'tis your purpose to restore My Pallas to my arms once more; If living is to see his face, Then grant me life, of your dear grace: No toil too hard to bear. But ah! if Fortune be my foe, And meditate some crushing blow, Now, now the thread in mercy break, While hope sees dim and cares mistake, While still I clasp thee darling boy, My latest and my only joy, Nor let assurance, worse than fear, With cruel tidings wound my ear.
 * O ye Gods, and O great Jove,
 * p. 295

Book IX


O Rutules! mine is all the blame; He did no wrong, nor e'er could do; That sky, those stars attest 'tis true; Love for his friend too freely shown, This was his crime, and this alone.
 * Me, guilty me, make me your aim,
 * p. 324

Dim fades a purple flower: Their weary necks so poppies bow, O'erladen by the shower.
 * Thus, severed by the ruthless plough,
 * p. 324

No day shall make your memory fail From off the heart of time.
 * Blest pair! if aught my verse avail,
 * p. 324

Go on and raise your glories higher.
 * 'Tis thus that men to heaven aspire:
 * p. 333

Book X


Is all the heritage of man: 'Tis virtue's part by deeds of praise To lengthen fame through after days.
 * Each has his destined time: a span
 * p. 367

To fate and to the future blind, Presumptuous and o'erweening still When Fortune follows at its will!
 * O impotence of man's frail mind
 * p. 369

Book XI
To wrench away the blade: Fixed in her ribs the weapon stands, Closed by the wound it made. Bloodless and faint, she gasps for breath; Her heavy eyes sink down in death; Her cheek's bright colors fade.
 * In vain she strives with dying hands
 * p. 427

Book XII
What madness mars my sober mind?
 * Why reel I thus, confused and blind?
 * p. 436

Indignant shame and passion blind, The tempest of the lover's mind, The soldier's high disdain.
 * Fierce boils in every vein
 * p. 465

The centre of Italian worth.
 * Let Rome be glorious on the earth,
 * p. 472

Satires


Who says no word for him when others blame, Who courts a reckless laugh by random hits, Just for the sake of ranking among wits, Who feigns what he ne'er saw, a secret blabs, Beware him, Roman! that man steals or stabs!
 * He who maligns an absent friend's fair fame,
 * Book I, satire iv, p. 18

With life so short 'twere wrong to lose a day.
 * Then take, good sir, your pleasure while you may;
 * Book II, satire viii, p. 85

Why make such game of this poor life of ours?
 * O Fortune, cruellest of heavenly powers,
 * Book II, satire viii, p. 94

Epistles
Or straw, it may be, that torments your eye; Why, when a thing devours your mind, adjourn Till this day year all thought of the concern? Come now, have courage to be wise: begin: You're halfway over when you once plunge in: He who puts off the time for mending, stands A clodpoll by the stream with folded hands, Waiting till all the water be gone past; But it runs on, and will, while time shall last.
 * You lose no time in taking out a fly,
 * Book I, epistle ii, p. 104

And think each day that dawns the last you'll see; For so the hour that greets you unforeseen Will bring with it enjoyment twice as keen.
 * Let hopes and sorrows, fears and angers be,
 * Book I, epistle iv, p. 108

Or 'tis high venture that achieves high aim.
 * Virtue's a mere name,
 * Book I, epistle xvii, p. 138

What moves derision than what claims respect.
 * For easier 'tis to learn and recollect
 * Book II, epistle i, p. 160

Art of Poetry


Puts dolphins among forests, boars in seas.
 * Who hopes by strange variety to please,
 * p. 172

The hearer's soul, and move it at its will.
 * Mere grace is not enough: a play should thrill
 * p. 175

To crush the proud and elevate the poor.
 * The gods implore
 * p. 180

What's sent abroad you never can revoke.
 * What's kept at home you cancel by a stroke:
 * p. 188

Was sent on him, this love of making verse.
 * None knows the reason why this curse
 * p. 191

The Poems of Virgil Translated Into English Prose (1872)

 * In: Miscellaneous Writings of the Late John Conington, ed. by J. A. Symonds, Vol. II (1872)


 * A wet summer and a fine winter should be the farmer's prayer.
 * Georgics, Book I, p. 39


 * Arise from my bones, my unknown avenger.
 * Aeneid, Book IV, p. 216

Quotes about Conington

 * [John Conington's] translation of the Satires and Epistles of Horace [are] on the whole, perhaps, the best and most successful translation of a Classic, that exists in the English language.
 * Hugh Andrew Johnstone Munro, as quoted in The Quarterly Review, Vol. 130 (1871), p. 531