Features most noble and sublime,
Resplendent all the images,
In rich immortal draperies.
You give me colours that can never die,
But baffle time, and live through all eternity.
It is to wine we owe the productions of Eschylus and Anacreon, whose muses were very chilly, till Bacchus warmed them. Aurelius, the sophist, composed his best declamations in his cups. Herodes, called Saginatus Orator, the fattened Orator, never talked better, than after drinking pretty plentifully. And according to Horace, this was the case with Ennius.
“Ennius ipse pater nunquam nisi potus ad arma
Prosiluit dicenda —————— [10].”
Ennius himself ne’er sung of arms,
Martial exploits and wars alarms,