[620] Virg. has evidently imitated Pind. Pyth. 2. 39 foll., where Ixion gives a similar warning from his wheel: θεῶν δ᾽ ἐφετμαῖσιν Ἰξίονά φαντι ταῦτα βροτοῖς λέγειν ἐν πτερόεντι τροχῷ παντᾶ κυλινδόμενον: Τὸν εὐεργέταν ἀγαναῖς ἀμοιβαῖς ἐποιχομένους τίνεσθαι. Henry makes ‘non temnere divos’ a repetition of the preceding clause ‘Learn justice, and do not slight the command of the gods to be just:’ but this would be rather flat, and the story of Phlegyas as told by Serv. says that his crime was burning the temple of Apollo at Delphi, so that it would be truer to say that the last part of the line interprets the first, ‘iustitia’ meaning the rendering of their dues to all, gods as well as men. Taubm. has a curious note, “Versus in sano sensu auro expendendus: qui quidem status et summa est omnium tragoediarum, et conpendium universae ethices. Testatur G. Fabricius se ex Laz. Bonamico viro gravi et fidei pleno audivisse puellam in agro Patavino fuisse fanaticam, quae Graece et Latine, omnium literarum ante insaniam expers, optume locuta sit: quae cum interrogata esset quaenam esset praestantissima apud Verg. sententia, hunc ipsum versum clara voce ter pronuntiasse.”
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John Conington. P. Vergili Maronis opera. P. Vergili Maronis Opera. The works of Virgil, with a Commentary by John Conington, M.A. Late Corpus Professor of Latin in the University of Oxford. London. Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane. 1876.
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