His great friend Fuscus twits him, as Will Honeycomb twitted Mr. Spectator, with his passion for a country life (Ep. I, x). "You are a Stoic," Horace says, "your creed is to live according to Nature. Do you expect to find her in the town or in the country? whether of the two yields more peaceful nights and sweeter sleep? is a marble floor more refreshing to the eyes than a green meadow? water poured through leaden pipes purer than the crystal spring? Even amid your Corinthian columns you plant trees and shrubs; though you drive out Nature she will silently return and supplant your fond caprices. Do interpose a little ease and recreation amid the money-grubbing which confines you to the town. Money should be the servant, not the queen, the captive, not the conqueror. If you want to see a happy man, come to me in the country. I have only one thing wanting to perfect happiness, my desire for your society." Two longer letters are written to his young friend Lollius (Ep. I, ii, xviii). The first is a study of Homer, which he has been reading in the country. In the "Iliad" he is disgusted by the reckless selfishness of the leaders; in the hero of the "Odyssey" he sees a model of patient, wise endurance, and impresses the example on his friend. It is curious that the great poet of one age, reading the greater poet of another, should fasten his attention, not on the poetry, but on the ethics of his predecessor. The remaining letter is called out by Lollius' appointment as confidential secretary to some man of great consequence; an office such as Horace himself declined when offered by Augustus. The post, he says, is full of difficulty, and endangering to self-respect: the servility it exacts will be intolerable to a man so truthful, frank, and independent as his friend. Let him decline it; or, if committed, get out of it as soon as possible.
Epistles there are without a moral purpose, called forth by some special occasion. He sends his "Odes" by one Asella for presentation to Augustus, punning on the name, as representing an Ass laden with manuscripts (Ep. I, xiii). The fancy was carried out by Pope in his frontispiece to the "Dunciad." Then his doctor tells him to forsake Baiae as a winter health resort, and he writes to one Vala, who lives in southern Italy, inquiring as to the watering places lower down the coast (Ep. I, xv). He must have a place where the bread is good and the water pure; the wine generous and mellow; in the market wild boars and hares, sea-urchins and fine fish. He can live simply at home, but is sick now and wants cherishing, that he may come back fat as one of the Phaeacians—luxurious subjects, we remember, of King Alcinous in the "Odyssey,"
Good food we love, and music, and the dance,
Garments oft changed, warm baths, and restful beds.
Odyssey, viii, 248.
Julius Florus, poet and orator, presses him to write more lyrics (Ep. II, ii). For many reasons, no, he answers. I no longer want money. I am getting old. Lyrics are out of fashion. No one can write in Rome. I have become fastidious. His sketch of the ideal poet is believed to portray the writings of his friend Virgil. It is nobly paraphrased by Pope:
But how severely with themselves proceed
The men, who write such verse as we can read!
Their own strict judges, not a word they spare,
That wants or force, or light, or weight, or care;