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Those praises that seemed obtrusive when I myself received them became agreeable to me when addressed to Varius or to Macer. But at bottom I am rustic and uncultivated. I take pleasure in the society of animals; I was so zealous in observing them and took so much care of them that I was regarded, not altogether wrongly, as a good veterinary surgeon.
Then there are Varius and Pollio, in epic and tragedy respectively, of whose forceful directness he does approve. The passage is important not only because it reveals a contemporaneous view of Vergil's position but because it shows Horace thus early as the spokesman of the "classical" coterie, the tenets of which in the end prevailed.
His early intimacy with Varius, the Caesarian poet, and possibly the general feeling among his fellow provincials, may have attracted him from the first to Caesar's name; his disposition, deeply affected by power or greatness, naturally inclined him to show loyalty to a person; and the spell of success when won on such a scale as that of Augustus doubtless wrought upon his poetical genius.
To him I may add Q. Metellus Celer, who, though certainly no Orator, was far from being destitute of utterance: but Q. Varius, C. Carbo, and Cn. Pomponius, were men of real Elocution, and might almost be said to have lived upon the Rostra. C. Julius too, who was then a Curule Aedile, was daily employed in making Speeches to the people, which were composed with great neatness and accuracy.
The "Thyestes" of Varius was regarded in its day as equal to Greek tragedies. Ennius composed tragedies in a vigorous style, and was regarded by the Romans as the parent of their literature, although most of his works have perished. Virgil borrowed many of his thoughts, and was regarded as the prince of Roman song in the time of Cicero. The Latin language is greatly indebted to him.
But Q. Varius was a man of quicker invention, and, at the same time, had an equal freedom of expression: besides which, he had a bold and spirited delivery, and a vein of elocution which was neither poor, nor coarse and vulgar; in short, you need not hesitate to pronounce him an Orator. Cn.
"Of the ancient tragedians Accius and Pacuvius are the most renowned for the gravity of their sentiments, the weight of their words, and the dignity of their characters. But brilliancy of touch and the last polish in completing their work seems to have been wanting, not so much to themselves as to their times. Next comes the Thyestes of Varius, which may be compared with any of the Greek plays.
It must, then, be a very noble love: Augustus, Pollio, Varius, Maecenas, the greatest statesmen of their day, they were verse-makers. Cardinal Richelieu was a verse-maker; Walter Raleigh and Philip Sidney, Fox, Burke, Sheridan, Warren Hastings, Canning, even the grave William Pitt, all were verse-makers.
Virgil and Varius introduced him to Maecenas, who received the bashful poet with distant hauteur, and did not again send for him until nine months had elapsed. This circumspection of Maecenas was only natural, for Horace was of a very different stamp from Varius and Virgil, who were warm admirers of Octavius.
On the other hand the tribune Marcus Plautius Silvanus, who entered on his office on the 10th of December of the same year, carried a law which took the commission of high treason out of the hands of the capitalist jurymen, and entrusted it to other jurymen who were nominated by the free choice of the tribes without class qualification; the effect of which was, that this commission was converted from a scourge of the moderate party into a scourge of the ultras, and sent into exile among others its own author, Quintus Varius, who was blamed by the public voice for the worst democratic outrages the poisoning of Quintus Metellus and the murder of Drusus.
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