The nature of those circumstances which demand this usage of óórε with the optative mood, if not sufficiently clear from the instance thus given, is determined by several other instances which Dawes has produced, of ómóre similarly employed. Of Tov, also in the same usage preceding the optative, with the preter-imperfect tense (for that is the idiom) of the indicative mood in the other member of the sentence, Dawes has given proof quite sufficient. [M. C. 256. Ed. B. 253.] Αλλῃ δὲ κἄλλῃ δωμάτων στρωφωμένη, ΕΙ ΠΟΥ φίλων ΒΛΕΨΕΙΕΝ οἰκετῶν δέμας, And wandering up and down the house, whenever she saw a favourite domestic, so oft the wretched dame would weep. The particle eì occurs in a similar construction. Kai oi μὲν ὄνοι, ἐπεί τις διώκοι, προδραμόντες ἂν εἱστήκεσαν πολύ γὰρ τοῦ ἵππου θάττον ἔτρεχον) καὶ πάλιν, ἐπεὶ πλησιάζοι ὁ iππоç, тaνтà inoίovv. Xenoph. Anabas. p. 45, ex emendatione Porsoni; quem vide ad Eur. Phon. 412. (Cf. Donalds. Gr. Gr. 514, 580.) V. "Quod autem eruditissimos quosque videtur fefellisse, observare libet, Verba istius formæ, cujus est àίoot, nusquam vel notione optativa adhiberi, vel cum vocula kèv sive av conjungi; sed temporibus præteritis significatione futura perpetuo subjici. Ἐγὼ γὰρ ὢν μειράκιον ΗΠΕΙΛΗΣ ̓ ὅτι Εἰς τοὺς δικαίους καὶ σοφοὺς καὶ κοσμίους Móvovs BAAIOIMHN.-Plut. 88." [M. C. 103. Ed. B. 105.] For I when a stripling threatened that I would visit the honest and wise and respectable-and no others. 1. If this dictum be true, (and I have met with nothing to disprove it,) all the other usages of the future optative must be struck off the roll without delay. a. ChooITE: fare thee well. "Neque enim futurum istius formæ tribuitur." [M. C. 11. Ed. B. ii.] B. μãλdov av rooíuny, "locutio est Græcis ignota. Futurum utique formæ optativæ nihilo rectius cum particula av conjungitur, quam optanti tribuitur." [M. C. iv. Ed. B. iv.] 2. The future infinitive, it has been already remarked, keeps no company with the particle av. The aversion to woìv preceding it, in what is called government, seems pretty much the same. Mr. Elmsley (ad Iph. Aul. v. 1459) has justly suggested, that πρὶν σπαράζεσθαι κόμας is a solecism. The looser usage of the aorist infinitive with av or without it, affords no excuse for breaking down the narrow fence of its neighbour. 3. For the same reason Mr. Elmsley, ad Iph. T. v. 937, appears to me justly to condemn Keλεúσ0εiç Spáσεiv as not legitimate Greek; while (ad Ed. R. v. 272) he does not with equal decision second the Scholiast, who in reference to εxoμaι, in v. 269, writes thus-φθαρῆναι δεῖ γράφειν, οὐ φθερεῖσθαι. The syntax of the line ̓Αλλ ̓ ὧδε προέθηκεν ἐλευθερίης ἀπολαύσειν, is condemned by Dawes, on the very same principle. "Nec vero futurum verbo πро0ŋкεV commode subjungi potest." [M. C. 111. Ed. B. iii.] 4. In the syntax of uλw, the infinitive mood following it most usually occurs in the future tense, but not universally. The authority of Porson ad Orest. v. 929, on v. 1549, μéλλw κτανεῖν, has pronounced “aoristum recte postponi verbo μέλλειν.” Mr. Elmsley, ad Heraclid. v. 710, gives his sentence thus on the subject: "Ubicunque levi emendatione pro yoáfa restitui potest ypápa aut yoáyev, restituendum mihi videtur." VI. "Nos primi monemus, formæ verborum optativæ, cum certis voculis, va puta, oppa, et μn, conjunctæ eum esse usum, ut verbis de tempore non nisi præterito usurpatis subjungatur, istique adeo Latinorum tempori AMAREM respondeat; subjunctivam contra verbis non nisi præsentis vel futuræ significationis subjungi, atque alteri isti apud Romanos tempori AMEM respondere." [M. C. 82, 3. 272. 329-85. 268. 321.] Generally speaking, where a purpose, end, result, is denoted by the help of the particles, iva, öppa, μń, &c. I. If both the action and the purpose of it belong entirely to time past, the purpose is denoted by the optative mood only. II. If the action belong to the time present or future, the purpose is denoted by the subjunctive, and not otherwise. This is remarkably well illustrated by Dawes out of Homer and Plato. In the Iliad E. 127, 8, we read, ̓Αχλύν δ' αὖ τοι ἀπ ̓ ὀφθαλμῶν ἕλον, ἣ πρὶν ἐπῆεν, "I HAVE REMOVED the mist from thine eyes, that thou MAYST DISTINGUISH," &c. In the second Alcibiades of Plato, sub finem: wσTEρ T Διομήδει φησὶ τὴν ̓Αθήναν Ομηρος ἀπὸ τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν ΑΦΕΛΕΙΝ τὴν ἀχλύν, ΟΦΡ ̓ εὖ ΓΙΝΩΣΚΟΙ ἠμὲν θεὸν ἠδὲ καὶ ἄνδρα. "Homer tells us that Minerva REMOVED the mist from his eyes, that he MIGHT DISTINGUISH," &c. Briefly, it is right to say, ἐπορεύθη, ἵνα μάθοι, and πορεύεται oι πορεύσεται, ἵνα μάθη. Yet a few remarks may be useful, and even necessary, to assist the young scholar in discriminating betwixt real exceptions and such only as appear to be; for no one mistakes the following modes of syntax as legitimate : φυλάττετε νῦν, ὅπως μὴ οἴχοιτο. τότε γὰρ ἐφυλάττετε, ὅπως μὴ οἴχηται. 1. Since the Greek aorist, like the Latin preterite, is not only taken in the narrative way, as ypata, I wrote; but sometimes also in the use of our present perfect, I have written: it may in its latter usage be followed by the subjunctive. The remark is Dawes', when speaking most exactly on the dramatic passage of Homer as varied in narration by Plato, ubi supra. Bp. Monk, ad Hippolyt. v. 1294, has shown very clearly under what circumstances this syntax is legitimate. 2. Since, in narrating past events, the Greek writers, particularly the Tragedians, often employ the present in one part, with the aorist in the other part of the sentence, [vid. R. P. ad Hecub. v. 21,] as well as vice versa, we are not to wonder if a syntax like the following be sometimes presented, with oris or with iva. Phœn. 47. κηρύσσει, [revera, ἐκήρυξεν] ὅστις μάθοι. κ. τ. λ. "He proclaimed such a reward to any one, that suOULD discover the meaning of the riddle." 3. If the verb denoting the principal act, while it is true of the present time, which it directly expresses, be virtually true of the past also in its beginning and continuance, the leading verb may stand in the present tense, and yet the purpose be denoted by the optative mood. In this way, I venture, though with some timidity, to translate the following passage of the Rana, vv. 21-24. Εἶτ ̓ οὐχ ὕβρις ταῦτ ̓ ἐστὶ καὶ πολλὴ τρυφή, "Is it not quite abominable, that I the mighty Bacchus HAVE BEEN trudging on foot, while I have had this fellow well mounted, that he MIGHT feel no fatigue ?" To escape from the emendation of Brunck, and with a view to suggest an idea which may perhaps be supported ere long by better authority, I risk at all events a modest conjecture for the present. 4. In passages where either syntax would be legitimate in other respects, some peculiarity of the case determines the choice at once. The following passage presents just such an instance: Ἡ γὰρ νέους ἕρποντας εὐμενεῖ πέδῳ, "Απαντα πανδοκοῦσα παιδείας ἔτλον, Πιστούς, ὅπως γένοισθε πρὸς χρέος τόδε. Sept. c. Theb. vv. 17-20. There is nothing in vv. 19, 20, to condemn the reading γένησθε. « She HATH REARED, that you may hereafter) become." But in vv. 17, 18, the decision lies. "She REARED you in tender and helpless infancy, that you MIGHT one day (as now) become her loyal guards'." III. A third syntax yet remains; which, though never, I believe, noticed by Dawes, deserves a place here. Τί δῆτ ̓ ἐμοὶ ζῆν κέρδος, ἀλλ ̓ οὐκ ἐν τάχει Prom. Vinct. vv. 773-6. I have selected this passage, for two reasons: it readily presents its own meaning, and shows the class of construction to which it belongs. But Heath wanted to alter it, from the confusion in his mind of the rules of Latin with those of Greek syntax; and his note affords a peculiar specimen of that influence operating in such matters, which I have mentioned in the few remarks prefixed to these Canons. " Ut constet grammatica ratio, omnino legendum άπαλλαγείην, ejecta particula γάρ, quæ paulo post sequitur, ne redundet metrum.” HEATH ad loc. 1 EMENDADATUM. 1836. When Porson, ad Phan. v. 68, writes thus : “ Deinde κραίνοιεν pro κραίνωσιν edidit Brunckius, ex Dawesii præcepto, Misc. Crit. p. 82. Sed hanc regulam non videntur per omnia servasse Tragici. Confer Hec. 1128-1133” [1120-1126.] he refers to a passage, apparently awkward, but which in fact exhibits a new canon of Attic usage, namely, that the subjunctive mood indicates the immediate, and the optative the remote consequence of the action contained in the principal verb. Vide Arnold's Thucydides, Book 111. 22. *Εδεισα, μή σοι πολέμιος λειφθεὶς ὁ παῖς Τροίαν ἀθροίσῃ καὶ ξυνοικίσῃ πάλιν Γνόντες δ' Αχαιοὶ ζῶντα Πριαμιδῶν τινα Φρυγῶν ἐς αἶαν αὖθις αἴροιεν στόλον, Τρώων, ἐν ᾧπερ νῦν, ἄναξ, ἐκάμνομεν. In the above passage, the first object of apprehension (so pretended) was young Polydore's surviving to rebuild Troy; the second, but contingent on that, was another expedition from Greece to destroy it, along with all the consequences of trouble and devastation to the neighbouring states. |