134 THEOGXIS

But we are not^ ,to_suppose that such language as the last_couplet wore so much the expression of his serious inoods as of a gaiety rendered reckless by potations such as, we are obliged to confess, lent a not infrequent inspiration to his poetry.' Theognis is, according to his own theory, quite en regie when he retires from a banquet X " Not absolutely drunk nor sober quite." He glories in a state which he expresses by a Greek word, which seems to mean that of being fortified or steeled with wine, an ironical arming against the cares of life to which he saw no shame in resorting. And perhaps too implicit credence is not to be given to the professions of indifference to wealth and character, which are made by a poet who can realise in verse such an experience as is portrayed in the fragment we are about to cite : " My brain grows dizzy, whirled and overthrown With wine : my senses are no more my own. The ceiling and the walls are wheeling round ! * But let me try ! perhaps my feet are sound. Let me retire with my remaining sense, For fear of idle language and offence." (F.) In his more sober moments the poet could appreciate

• Juvenal, in Satire vi. 477-479, describes drinking-bouts

in imperial Rome prolonged " Till round and round the dizzy chambers roll, Till double lamps upon the table blaze, And stupor blinds the undiscerning gaze." Hodgson, 107.