The sense of difficulty and the joy of overcoming it meet us with a keen bracing effect in many passages of the poem. He speaks disdainfully of those enquirers who fall into error by shrinking from the more adventurous paths that lead to truth—
Ardua dum metuunt amittunt vera viai.
Without disowning the passion for fame,—'laudis spes magna,' so powerful an incentive to the Roman temperament,—he is more inspired and supported in his arduous task by 'the sweet love of the Muses.' The delight in the exercise of his art and the joyful energy sustained through the long processes of gathering and arranging his materials appear in such passages as iii. 419-20:—
Conquisita diu dulcique reperta labore
Digna tua pergam disponere carmina cura:
and again at ii. 730—
Nunc age dicta meo dulci quaesita labore
Percipe.
The thoroughness and devotion of a student tell their own tale in such expressions as the 'studio disposta fideli,' and the 'noctes vigilare serenas' in the dedication to Memmius, and in the more enthusiastic acknowledgment of the source from which he drew his philosophy at iii. 29, etc.—