The necessity of virtue and wisdom, without which freedom is a snare and not a blessing, constitutes a favourite topic with him. In the satire in which Davus takes the privilege of the Saturnalia, the poet puts into the mouth of his Grecian slave, by way of making the object of preference more characteristic and less offensive, a description of Rome, as a sink of impurity; of Athens, as the seat of learning and virtue. In earlier and more heroic days, a person would have been considered as a coxcomb, and a violator of public decency, had he appeared with more than one ring. In the more luxurious times, it was the fashion to wear three. He describes the inconsistency of mankind, in vacillating between virtue and vice, in a very spirited portrait : Sæpe notatus Cum tribus annellis, modo læva Priscus inani, In a letter to Mæcenas, he attacks two of the most common vices, which throw impediments in the way of human happiness. The first is avarice and ambition warring with united forces; the second is levity and inconstancy in the objects. of pursuit. For these two diseases he proposes two remedies truth, and honesty or honour: what the Greeks term génov, the Latins decorum, which is Cicero's word throughout the first book of his Offices. His definition of it includes the practice of all the virtues; a course of action worthy of human nature. He seems indeed to consider it as the leading distinction between the instinct of the lower animals and the reason of man: -"Nec vero illa parva vis naturæ est rationisque, quod unum hoc animal sentit, quid sit ordo; quid sit, quod deceat; in factis dictisque qui modus." Horace exhibits himself here in an interesting light; as abjuring slighter composition, and devoting himself to philosophy, which consists in the contemplation and knowledge of things, and to what he calls the decens, or that conduct of which the verum is the parent. He professes however to be the votary of no sect. Truth was his choice, wherever he could find it. His experienced scrutiny had discovered the forte and the feeble of every sect: we have seen in repeated instances, how he calls them back from their fallacies, and winds a retreat when they have lost their game, and are pursuing the counterscent of prejudice. He was the huntsman, not one of the hounds: had he belonged to the pack, his cry might have been louder than the rest, but its articulation would have been lost in the hubbub and confusion of the field : Nunc itaque et versus et cætera ludicra pono; Quid verum atque decens, curo et rogo, et omnis in hoc sum; Condo, et compono, quæ mox depromere possim : Lib. i. epist. 1. Truth accomplishes the philosopher, and virtue makes the man happy. The sincere enquirer after both, to be successful, must be earnest, consistent, and unwearied in his endeavours: he must think for himself, without rejecting either the discoveries or the experiences of others. Difficulties vanish before assiduous research, and proficiency is the reward of perseverance. Plato has a fine passage on this subject, in the sixth book of his Republic:-'Hyouμένης δὴ ἀληθείας, οὐκ ἄν πολε, οἶμαι, φαῖμεν αὐτῇ χορὸν κακῶν ἀκολουθῆσαι. Πῶς γάς ; Αλλ' ὑγιές τε καὶ μέτριον ἦθος· ᾧ καὶ σωφροσύνην ἕπεσθαι. The next epistle, to Lollius, contains precautions against ambition, avarice, debauchery, and passion: Semper avarus eget: certum voto pete finem. The miseries and inconsistency of avarice have furnished an abundant topic to all writers on morals and manners. From the following passage of Cicero pro Roscio, we learn how easy it is for those who are not blinded by avarice, to detect the machinations of the avaricious man, or to lead him to his own ruin: "O præclarum testem, judices! O gravitatem dignam expectatione! O vitam honestam, atque ejusmodi, ut libentibus animis ad ejus testimonium vestrum jusjurandum accommodetis! Profecto non tam perspicue istorum maleficia videremus, nisi ipsos cœcos redderet cupiditas, et avaritia, et audacia." Nisi SAT. Sed quibus captus dolis, Nostros dabit perductus in laqueos pedem ? Hac Hac Dubiumque Libycæ Syrtis intrabit fretum ; Seneca in Thyeste, 286. In an epistle to Numicius, our author proves that the admiration of unworthy objects is a principal cause of misery: Hunc solem, et stellas, et decedentia certis Lib. i. epist. 6. Horace's reasoning stands on this foundation. Nothing is naturally so calculated to excite the astonishment and raise the admiration of the human mind, as the structure of the universe, the uniformity of motion in the bodies that compose our system, the revolutions of the seasons, and the complicated, yet methodised arrangement of existing things. Some philosophers have seen hunc solem, et stellas, and yet have admired nothing. If they have not been moved by these wonders, if their hearts have not been affected by the connection between themselves and this stupendous machinery of material splendour, how can we admire the inferior glories of the mine or of the palace? How can we value, or even withhold our contempt from the trappings of state, or the frivolity of popular applause, and the ephemeral triumph of political honours? This world contains nothing which a wise man would admire. The hierarchies of heaven obey the will of their Creator: the impression their magnificence should make on us, is to lead us to look down on them, and up to their first Mover. The last point of view in which we have to look at Horace, is the literary and the critical. The scope of his ambition in his writings, was to please judges of a certain cast: Nam satis est equitem mihi plaudere, ut audax, Contemtis aliis, explosa Arbuscula dixit. Lib. i. sat. 10. The Equites, or Knights, are here taken for the nobility at large, and especially those of a cultivated mind. To stand well with posterity, we must please our contemporaries of the best taste. Each age furnishes a few; no age furnishes many. But a reputation so established is preferable to the shouts of the vulgar, which are silent after the first explosion a fame founded on enlightened approbation is like the swell of a well-tuned instrument; barely audible when the tone is first emitted, but increasing in progressive vibration, till it fills the area within which it is confined. As his own critic, he maintains his claim to originality, though he had been accused of plagiarism: Libera per vacuum posui vestigia princeps, Lib. i. epist. 19. He maintains that he had discovered a path unknown to the poets of his country, and that he is a guide, not a follower: but he acknowledges that he has imitated the Greeks, and points out how his countrymen may imitate him, instead of copying what is least valuable. In the second |