Frank H. Cilley. THE WORKS OF APULEIUS COMPRISING THE METAMORPHOSES, OR GOLDEN ASS, THE GOD OF SOCRATES, THE FLORIDA, AND HIS DEFENCE, OR A DISCOURSE ON MAGIC. A NEW TRANSLATION. TO WHICH ARE ADDED, A METRICAL VERSION OF CUPID AND PSYCHE, AND MRS. TIGHE'S PSYCHE, A POEM IN SIX CANTOS. LONDON: BELL & DALDY, 6 YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN, 1866. BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION. 66 66 THE author of the celebrated romance of "THE GOLDEN Ass" lived in the early part of the second century, under the Antonines. By most modern biographers he is called Lucius Apuleius, or Appuleius, but the authority on which they assign him that prænomen is very questionable. He was a native of Madaura, an inland African town, and he styles himself, in allusion to its position on the borders of two kingdoms, a half-and-half Numidian and Getulian;” adding that, in that respect, he resembled the elder Cyrus, who was a Semi-Median and Semi-Persian." Madaura, after having formed part of the kingdom of Syphax, was bestowed by the Romans on their ally Masinissa, and being eventually resumed and peopled by veterans, it obtained the rank and immunities of a "colony," and rose to considerable splendour. The father of Apuleius filled the office of duumvir, the highest magisterial dignity in his native place, and bequeathed at his death the sum of nearly two millions of sesterces to his two sons, one of whom, the subject of our present inquiries, succeeded to his office. These facts we learn from the direct testimony of the son in his Apologia or Defence; but most of the biographers of Apuleius add other particulars, drawn from the assumption that, under the character of Lucius, the imaginary hero of the story of "the Golden Ass," the author has related sundry details of his own personal history. Upon this supposition, we are told that our author's prænomen was Lucius, that his father's name was Theseus, his mother's Salvia, and that she was of a Thessalian family, and descended from the illustrious Plutarch; furthermore, that Apuleius was ignorant of the Latin language until he visited Rome, where he acquired it without the aid of a master; and that by the time he arrived at the capital of the empire, he had so completely dissipated his patrimony, as to be under the necessity of selling his clothes, in order to defray the cost of his initiation into the mysteries of Osiris. This latter statement is at variance with the account which he gives of his fortune in the Apologia, where he says, merely, that it had been, "modice imminutum," somewhat impaired; the other particulars may or may not be true. There is, no doubt, such a resemblance between Apuleius and Lucius, both as regards mental characteristics and outward incidents, that we can hardly suppose it to be fortuitous. It is highly probable that the author drew his hero from his own likeness; but on the other hand, it is absurd to look for literal fidelity in such a portrait. It is not likely, for instance, that Apuleius would have deemed it consistent with decorum to speak of himself, his father and his mother, by their real names, in so frolicsome a work of fiction as "The Golden Ass," since we find, that when addressing the sons of a friend in some complimentary verses of a peculiar character, such as the habits of his day allowed, he thought it his duty to invent pseudonymes for the objects of his flattery.* Apuleius received the first rudiments of education at Carthage, renowned at that time as a school of literature, and there he adopted the Platonic system of philosophy, in which he perfected himself by his subsequent studies at Athens. There, too, he laid the foundations of that copious stock of various and profound learning, through which he became the most distinguished literary character of his age. Still thirsting for knowledge, and impelled, like his own Lucius, by an insatiable curiosity to explore all that was hidden from the vulgar gaze, he travelled through Greece, Asia, and Italy, and became a member of many religious fraternities, and a proficient in their mysteries. After his return to Africa, he was about to renew his travels, and on his way to Alexandria was taken ill at Oëa, a maritime town, which some geographers have identified with the modern Tripoli. A young man, named Pontianus, whom * See Defence, p. 256. he had known as a fellow-student at Athens, invited the invalid to become the guest of his mother, a wealthy widow, named Pudentilla. In making this hospitable proposal, Pontianus had more in view than the comfort of his friend, and the restoration of his health. Pudentilla was herself also an invalid, being affected with a chronic complaint, which had lasted thirteen years-the duration of her widowhood-and for which her medical advisers all agreed in prescribing marriage as a remedy. The son, seeing his mother prepared to try the effect of that nostrum, was desirous that her new husband should be one of his own choosing. Accordingly, he begged Apuleius would do him the favour to become his stepfather, putting the affair to him, says the latter, in the light of an onerous service, such as one might ask a friend and a philosopher to undertake. The widow was neither young nor handsome, but she was virtuous, fond, and very rich. Apuleius, if not poor, was, at least, reduced in circumstances, in consequence of his long-continued course of study, his protracted residence in foreign countries, and various acts of generosity towards his friends and instructors; moreover, he was a philosopher; so in fine he married the widow. But this act involved some unpleasant consequences. Before it was accomplished, Pontianus had married the daughter of one Rufinus, who, long eager to secure to his son-in-law as large a share as possible in the fortune of Pudentilla, did all he could to prevent her marriage with Apuleius; and in this he was seconded by Pontianus, over whom he had acquired such an influence, as to make him look with aversion on the success of his own project. But notwithstanding all opposition, Pudentilla persisted in her resolution; and soon after her marriage, Pontianus died. His uncle, Emilianus, then united with Rufinus in endeavours to ruin Apuleius. They gave out that he had poisoned Pontianus, that he was a magician, and had gained the affections of Pudentilla by witchcraft. They even prosecuted him upon the latter charge, and the cause was tried at Sabrata, before Claudius Maximus, the proconsul of Africa. It was on that occasion he delivered the Defence, a translation of which |