mans, you may observe, that Horace represents at length the commonwealth of Rome under the figure of a ship, in the allegory that you meet with in the fourteenth ode of his first book.

O Nuvis, referent in mare te novi
Fluctus.

And shall the raging waves again

Bear thee back into the main?

T

Mr. CREECH.

Nor was any thing more usual than to represent a god in the shape and dress of an emperor.

Apellea cuperent te scribere cera,

Optassetque novo similem te ponere templo
Atticus Elei senior Jovis: et tua mitis
Ora Taras: tua sidereas imitantia flammas
Lumina, contempto mallet Rhodos aspera Phabo.

STATIUS de Equo Domitiani, Syl. 1.

Now had Apelles liv'd, he'd sue to grace
His glowing tablets with thy godlike face:
Phidias, a sculptor for the Pow'rs above!
Had wish'd to place thee with his iv'ry Jove.
Rhodes, and Tarentum, that with pride survey,
The thund'rer this, and that the god of day;
Each fam'd Colossus would exchange for thee,
And own thy form the loveliest of the three.

For the thought is general, you have just the same metaphorical compliment to Theodosius in Claudian, as the medal here makes to Trajan.

Nulla relicta foreta Romani nominis umbra,
Ni pater ille tuus jamjam ruitura subisset
Pondera, turbatamque ratem, certâque levasset
Naufragium commune manu.-

CLAUDIAN. de 4to, Conf. Honorii.

Had not thy sire deferr'd th' impending fate,
And with his solid virtue propp'd the state;
Sunk in oblivion's shade, the name of Rome,
An empty name! had scarce surviv'd her doom:
Half wreck'd she was, till his auspicious hand
Resum'd the rudder, and regain'd the land.

I shall only add, that this medal was stamped in honour of Trajan, when he was only Cæsar, as appears by the face of it. . . SARI TRAIANO.

We

The next is a reverse of Marcus Aurelius. have on it a Minerva* mounted on a monster, that Ausonius describes in the following verses.

Illa etiam Thalamos per trina ænigmata quærens
Qui bipes, et quadrupes foret, et tripes omnia solus;
Terruit Aoniam Volucris, Leo, Virgo; triformis
Sphinx, volucris pennis, pedibus fera, fronte puella.

To form the moster Sphinx, a triple kind,
Man, bird, and beast, by nature were combin'd:
With feather'd fans she wing'd th' aërial space;
And on her feet the lion-claws disgrace
The bloomy features of a virgin-face.
O'er pale Aönia panic horror ran,

While in mysterious speech she thus began:
"What animal, when yet the morn is new,
"Walks on four legs infirm; at noon on two:
"But day declining to the western skies,

"He needs a third; a third the night supplies?"

The monster, says Cynthio, is a sphinx, but for her meaning on this medal, I am not Edipus enough to unriddle it. I must confess, says Philander, the poets fail me in this particular. There is however a passage in Pausanias that I will repeat to you, though it is in prose, since I know no body else that has explained the medal by it. The Athenians, says he, drew a sphinx on the armor of Pallas, by reason of the strength and sagacity of this animal. The sphinx therefore signifies the same as Minerva herself, who was the goddess of arms as well as wisdom, and describes the emperor, as one of the poets expresses it,

-Studiis florentem utriusque Minervæ.

Whom both Minervas boast t'adopt their own.

The Romans joined both devices together, to make the emblem the more significant, as indeed they could

Fig. 22.

not too much extol the learning and military virtues of this excellent emperor, who was the best philosopher and the greatest general of his age.

We will close up this series of medals with one that was stamped under Tiberius to the memory of Augustus*. Over his head you see the star that his father Julius Cæsar was supposed to have been changed into.

Ecce Dionai processit Cæsaris astrum.

See, Cæsar's lamp is lighted in the skies.

Julius Caesar's light appears

As, in fair nights and smiling skies,

VIRG. Ecl. 9.

Mr. DRYDEN.

Hor.

The beauteous moon amidst the meaner stars. Mr. CREECH.

Vix ea fatus erat, mediâ cùm sede senatús

Constitit alma Venus, nulli cernenda, suique
Cæsaris eripuit membris, nec in aëra solvi
Passa recentem animam, cœlestibus intulit astris.
Dumque tulit lumen capere atque ignescere sensit,
Emisitque sinu: Lunâ evolut altius illa,
Flammiferumque trahens spatioso limite crinem,
Stella micat.-

Ov. Met. lib. 15.

This spoke; the goddess to the senate flew;
Where, her fair form conceal'd from mortal view,
Her Cæsar's heav'nly part she made her care,
Nor left the recent soul to waste to air;
But bore it upwards to its native skies:
Glowing with new-born fires she saw it rise;
Forth springing from her bosom up it flew,
And kindling, as it soar'd, a comet grew;
Above the lunar sphere it took its flight,
And shot behind it a long trail of light.

Mr. WELSTED.

Virgil draws the same figure of Augustus on Æneas's shield as we see on this medal. The commentators tell us, that the star was engraven on Augustus's helmet; but we may be sure Virgil means such a figure

* Fig. 23.

of the emperor as he used to be represented by in the Roman sculpture, and such a one as we may suppose this to be that we have before us.

Hinc Augustus agens Italos in prælia Cæsar,

Cum patribus, populogue, Penatibus, et magnis Diis,
Stans celsa in puppi; geminas cui tempora flammas

Læta vomunt, patriumque aperitur vertice sidus. VIRG. Æn. lib. 8.
Young Cæsar on the stern in armor bright,
Here leads the Romans, and the gods, to fight:
His beamy temples shoot their flames afar;
And o'er his head is hung the Julian star.

Mr. DRYDEN.

The thunderbolt that lies by him is a mark of his apotheosis, that makes him as it were a companion of Jupiter. Thus the poets of his own age that deified him living:

Divisum Imperium cum Jove Cæsar habet.

Hic socium summo cum Jove numen habet.

VIRG.

'Ov.

-Regit Augustus socio per signa Tonante. MANIL lib. 1.

Sed tibi debetur cælum, te fulmine pollens,

Accipiet cupidi Regia magna Jovis.

Ov. de Augusto ad Liviam.

He wears on his head the corona radiata, which at that time was another type of his divinity. The spikes that shoot out from the crown were to represent the rays of the sun. There were twelve of them, in allusion to the signs of the Zodiac. It is this kind of crown that Virgil describes.

-Ingenti mole Latinus

Quadrijugo vehitur curru, cui tempora circum
Aurati bis sex radii fulgentia cingunt,

Solis avi specimen

Four steeds the chariot of Latinus bear:

VIRG. En. lib. 12.

Twelve golden beams around his temples play,

To mark his lineage from the god of day. Mr. DRYDEN,

If you would know why the corona radiata is a representation of the sun, you may see it in the figure

of Apollo* on the next reverse, where his head is encompassed with such an arch of glory as Ovid and Statius mention, that might be put on and taken off at pleasure.

-Et genitor circum caput omne micantes
Deposuit radios-

Ov. Met. lib. 2.

The tender sire was touch'd with what he said,
And flung the blaze of glories from his head.

Imposuitque coma radios

Ibid.

Then fix'd his beamy circle on his head.

Licet ignipedum frænator equorum

Ipse tuis alte radiuntem crinibus arcum
Imprimat-

STAT. THEB. lib. 1. ad Domitianum.

Though Phoebus longs to mix his rays with thine,
And in thy glories more serenely shine.

Mr. POPE

In his right hand he holds the whip with which he is supposed to drive the horses of the sun: as in a pretty passage of Ovid, that some of his editors must needs fancy spurious.

Colligit amentes, et adhuc terrore paventes,

Phabus equos, stimuloque dolens et verbere sævit:

Sævit enim, natumque objectat, et imputat illis. Ov. Met. lib. 2.

Prevail'd upon at length, again he took

The harmless steeds, that still with horror shook,
And plies them with the lash, and whips them on,
And, as he whips, upbraids them with his son.

The double-pointed dart in his left hand is an emblem of his beams, that pierce through such an infinite depth of air, and enter into the very bowels of the earth. Accordingly Lucretius calls them the darts of the day, as Ausonius, to make a sort of witticism, has followed his example.

Non radii solis, neque lucida tela Diei.

*Fig. 24.

LUCRET.