THE ARGUMENT.
The judicious Casaubon, in his proem to this Satire, tells us that
Aristophanes, the grammarian, being asked what poem of
Archilochus' iambics he preferred before the rest, answered,
the longest. His answer may justly be applied to the Fifth
Satire; which, being of a greater length than any of the
rest, is also by far the most instructive. For this reason I
have selected it from all the others, and inscribed it to my
learned master, Dr. Busby; to whom I am not only obliged
myself for the best part of my own education, and that of my
two sons; but have also received from him the first and
truest taste of Persius. May he be pleased to find, in this
translation, the gratitude, or at least some small acknowledgment,
of his unworthy scholar, at the distance of forty-two
years from the time when I departed from under his tuition.
This Satire consists of two distinct parts: the first contains the
praises of the Stoic philosopher, Cornutus, master and tutor
to our Persius; it also declares the love and piety of Persius
to his well-deserving master; and the mutual friendship
which continued betwixt them, after Persius was now grown a
man; as also his exhortation to young noblemen, that they
would enter themselves into his institution. From hence he
makes an artful transition into the second part of his subject;
wherein he first complains of the sloth of scholars, and afterwards
persuades them to the pursuit of their true liberty.
Here our author excellently treats that paradox of the Stoics
which affirms that the wise or virtuous man is only free, and
that all vicious men are naturally slaves; and, in the
illustration of this dogma, he takes up the remaining part of
this inimitable Satire.
