By the two friends above mentioned, he was recommended to the patronage not only of Mecaenas, but of Augustus, with whom he, as well as Virgil, lived on a footing of the greatest intimacy. Satisfied with the luxury which he enjoyed at the first tables in (174) Rome, he was so unambitious of any public employment, that when the emperor offered him the place of his secretary, he declined it. But as he lived in an elegant manner, having, besides his house in town, a cottage on his Sabine farm, and a villa at Tibur, near the falls of the Anio, he enjoyed, beyond all doubt. a handsome establishment, from the liberality of Augustus. He indulged himself in indolence and social pleasure, but was at the same time much devoted to reading; and enjoyed a tolerable good state of health, although often incommoded with a fluxion of rheum upon the eyes.
Horace, in the ardour of youth, and when his bosom beat high with the raptures of fancy, had, in the pursuit of Grecian literature, drunk largely, at the source, of the delicious springs of Castalia; and it seems to have been ever after his chief ambition, to transplant into the plains of Latium the palm of lyric poetry. Nor did he fail of success:
Exegi monumentum aere perennius.—Carm. iii. 30.
More durable than brass a monument I've raised.
In Greece, and other countries, the Ode appears to have been the most ancient, as well as the most popular species of literary production. Warm in expression, and short in extent, it concentrates in narrow bounds the fire of poetical transport: on which account, it has been generally employed to celebrate the fervours of piety, the raptures of love, the enthusiasm of praise; and to animate warriors to glorious exertions of valour:
Musa dedit fidibus Divos, puerosque Deorum,
Et pugilem victorem, et equum certamine primnm,
Et juvenum curas, et libera vina referre.—Hor. De Arte Poet.
The Muse to nobler subjects tunes her lyre;
Gods, and the sons of Gods, her song inspire;
Wrestler and steed, who gained the Olympic prize,
Love's pleasing cares, and wine's unbounded joys.—Francis.
Misenum Aeoliden, quo non praestantior alter
Aere ciere viros, Martemque accendere cnatu. [275]
Virgil, Aeneid, vi.
. . . . . . . . . . . .
Sed tum forte cava dum personat aequora concha
Demens, et canto vocat in certamina Divos.—Ibid.
Misenus, son of Oeolus, renowned
The warrior trumpet in the field to sound;
With breathing brass to kindle fierce alarms,
And rouse to dare their fate in honourable arms.
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