Virgil.

According to Donatus, Virgil wrote a couplet in praise of Cæsar and posted it anonymously on the portals of the palace (31 B.C.). Bathyllus gave himself out as the author of this couplet, and on that account received a present from Cæsar. Next night Sic vos non vobis (“So you not for you”) was found written four times in the same place. The Romans were puzzled as to what was meant by these words, until Virgil came forward and completed the verse—adding a preliminary line, Hos ego versiculos feci, tulit alter honores, “I wrote the lines, another wears the bays.”

Shelley in Song to the Men of England wrote as a socialist:

The seed ye sow, another reaps;

The wealth ye find, another keeps;

The robes ye weave, another wears;

The arms ye forge, another bears.

In previous verses he refers to bees, and, of course, the above quotation was in his mind.


I know, of late experience taught, that him