A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

HORATIUS HORATIUS. 521
either ill his magnificent palace on the Esquiline, he seems to have inclined to be a valetudinarian.
or in some of his luxurious villas in the neighbour- (Epist. i. 7. 3.) VVhen young he was irascible in
hood of Rome. Horace was one of his chosen temper, but easily placable. (Carm. i. 16. 22, &c.,
society. iii. 14. 27, Epist. i. 20. 25.) In dress he was
This constant transition from the town to the rather careless. (Epist. i. 1. 94.) His habits,
country life is among the peculiar charms of the even after he became richer, were generally frugal
Horatian poetry, which thus embraces every form and abstemious; though on occasions, both in youth
of Roman society. He describes, with the same and in maturer age, he seems to have indulged ill
intimate familiarity, the manners, the follies, and conviviality. He liked choice wine, and in the
vices of the capital; the parasites, the busy cox- society of friends scrupled not to enjoy the luxuries
combs, the legacy-hunters, the luxurious banquets of his time.
of the city; the easy life, the quiet retirement, the Horace was never married; he seems to have
more refined society, the highest aristocratical cir- entertained that aristocratical aversion to legitimate
cles, both in the city, and in the luxurious country wedlock, against which, in the higher orders, Aupalace of the villa; and even something of the gustus strove so vainly, both by the infliction of
simple manners and frugal life of the Sabine pea- civil disabilities and the temptation of civil prisantry. vileges. In his various amours he does not appear
The intimate friendship of Horace introduced him to have had any children. Of these amours the
naturally to the notice of the other great men of his patient'ingenuity of some modern writers has enperiod, to Agrippa, and at length to Augustus him- deavoured to trace the regular date and succession,
self. The first advances to friendship appear to if to their own satisfaction, by no means to that of
have been made by the emperor; and though the poet their readers. With the exception of the adventook many opportunities of administering courtly ture with Canidia or Gratidia, which belongs to
flattery to Augustus, celebrating his victories over his younger days, and one or two cases in which
Antony, and on the western and eastern frontiers the poet alludes to his more advanced age, all is
of the empire, as well as admiring his acts of peace, arbitrary and conjectural; and though in some of
yet he seems to have been content with the patron- his amatory Odes, and in one or two of the latter
age of Maecenas, and to have declined the offers of Epodes, there is the earnestness and force of real
favour and advancement made by Augustus himself. passion, others seem but the play of a graceful
According to the life by Suetonius, the emperor fancy. Nor is the notion of Buttman, though
desired Maecenas to make over Horace to him as rejected with indignation by those who have
his private secretary; and instead of taking offence wrought out this minute chronologyof the mistresses
at the poet's refusal to accept this office of trust of Horace, by any means improbable, that some
and importance, spoke of him with that familiarity of them are translations or imitations of Greek
(if the text be correct, coarse and unroyal fami- lyrics, or poems altogether ideal, and without anyreal
liarity) which showed undiminished favour, and groundwork. (Buttman, Essay in German, in the
bestowed on him considerable sums of money. Berlin Transactions, 1804, and in his Mythologus,
He was ambitious also of being celebrated in the translated in the Philological Museum, vol. i.
poetry of Horace. The Carmen Seculare was written p. 439.)
by his desire; and he was, ill part at least, the The political opinions of Horace were at first
cause of Horace adding the fourth book of Odes, republican. Up to the battle of Philippi (as we
by urging him to commemorate the victory of his have seen) he adhered to the cause of Brutus. On
step-sons Drusus and Tiberius over the Vindelici. his return to Rome, he quietly acquiesced in the
With all the other distinguished men of the great change which established the imperial montime, the old aristocracy, like Aelius Lamia, the archy. He had abandoned public life altogether,
statesmen, like Agrippa, the poets Varius, Virgil, and had become a man of letters. His dominant
Pollio, Tibullus, Horace lived on terms of mutual feeling appears to have been a profound horror for
respect and attachment. The "Personae Hora- the crimes and miseries of the civil wars. The sterntianae" would contain almost every famous name est republican might rejoice in the victory of Rome
of the age of Augustus. and Augustus over Antony and the East. A goHorace died on the 17th of November, A. U. C. vernment, under whatever form, which maintained
746, B. C. 8, aged nearly 57. His death was so internal peace, and the glory of the Roman arlns
sudden, that he had not time to make his will; on all the frontiers, in Spain, in Dacia, and in the
but he left the administration of his affairs to East, commanded his grateful homage. He may
Augustus, whom he instituted as his heir. He was have been really, or may have fancied himself, deburied on the slope of the Esquiline Hill, close ceived by the consummate skill with which Augusto his friend and patron Maecenas, who had died tus disguised the growth of his own despotism
before him in the same year. (Clinton, Fasti Hellen. under the old republican forms. Thus, though he
sub ann.) gradually softened into the friend of the emperor's
Horace has described his own person. (Epist. favourite, and at length the poetical courtier of the
i. 20. 24.) He was of short stature, with dark emperor himself, he still maintained a certain ineyes and dark hair (Art. Po:t. 37), but early dependence of character. He does not suppress
tinged with grey. (Epist. I.c.; Carm. iii. 14. his old associations of respect for the republican
25). In his youth he was tolerably robust (Epist. leaders, which break out in his admiration of the
i. 7. 26), but suffered from a complaint in his indomitable spirit of Cato; and he boasts, rather
eyes. (Sat. i. 5. 30.) In more advanced life than disguises, his services in the army of Brutus.
he grew fat, and Augustus jested about his pro- If, with the rest of the world, he acquiesced in the
tuberant belly. (Aug. Epist. Frag. apied Sie- inevitable empire, it is puerile to charge him with
ton. in Vita.) His health was not always good. apostacy.
Ile was not only weary of the fatigue of war, but The religion of Horace was that of his age, and
unfit to bear it (Carin. ii. 6, 7, Epod. i. 1.5), and of the men of the world in his age. He maintains